Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) -- The President of the Republic of Uzbekistan has approved the Strategy for social protection of the Republic of Uzbekistan. The strategy endeavours to develop a social protection system based on International Labour Organization’s Social Protection Floors Recommendation (No. 202). The Strategy covers four areas: social care services, social insurance, social assistance and active labour market programs. The additional fifth area covers the institutional reforms of the social protection system.

In the first area, on social services, the Strategy emphasizes building the system of social work at the local level via mahallas women’s activists. Women’s activists will perform the functions of social workers tasked with helping families in need. In 2022-2023 these women activists will take training on social work with low-income families. The idea behind the approach is to study the family condition on an individual base and provide comprehensive social protection. Each activist will have a tablet to enter relevant information based on their study and observations of the family condition.

For instance, let us look at a family living in a remote village. The mother in this family is not employed because she has to care for her sick child. She is unaware of the state support programs and care services for children like hers. In a new system, a women’s activist will visit this family, identify their multiple problems and study their living conditions. Learning about the child’s permanent sickness, she would send a child to an appropriate disability assessment service provider. Once a child’s disability has been assessed, women’s activists will assist this family in applying for social services and support programs. In particular, the state will provide technical aids to this child and assign a monthly disability allowance to a child and a care allowance to a mother based on the child’s sickness. Moreover, if the child is of school age, a women’s activist will help to get the child into school. In short, the system will ensure the complex social protection of the family.

To sum up, the state will provide social assistance and care services by individually studying the condition of each family.

The second area, on social insurance, envisions the formation of the Social Insurance Fund in August this year. At this stage the Social Insurance Fund will be financed from the State Budget. Later, based on the fiscal analysis, the Ministry of Finance will work on additional revenue sources for the Fund. So, what is expected from this system?

At the initial stage, i.e. from September, formally employed women in non-budget organizations based on a labour contract (reflected in the information system of the Ministry of Employment and Labour Relations') will receive part of the maternity allowance from the State. The benefit amount is 2 million sums based on minimum consumption expenditures for four months. The employers will pay only the remaining amount of the maternity benefit. Thus, this reform exempts employers from part of the social security payment, giving them an incentive to hire women. Moreover, the system would incentivize employment formalization of the women employed informally, i.e. without a labour contract or a work record book. The Strategy aims gradually removing the responsibility of employers for payment of maternity benefits. 

In the following stages, the Social Insurance Fund will cover the payment of sick leave benefits and unemployment insurance in the event of the liquidation of the employer.

The third area, on social assistance, aims to improve the effectiveness of state social assistance via adding conditionality to the existing programs (so-called social contract system). In the initial stage, the conditions may include the child's attendance at school. Why add such conditionality? Because a children's education determines their future. Educated children are more likely to get an appropriate job in the future, which should break the intergenerational low-income cycle. Another condition may require vaccinations to prevent diseases in children. 

The fourth area, active labour market programs, seeks to improve employment support programs guaranteeing stable income. One of the current employment support programs engages unemployed people in public works. The disadvantage of this program is its temporary nature, and soon the beneficiary is likely to become unemployed again. This area emphasizes the development of vocational training programs, which are longer-term oriented rather than temporary support.

Additionally, the provision of entrepreneurship promotion and employment support subsidies will have conditionality. Let us look at an unemployed person subsidized to run a home workshop. But this person can either give up the idea of running his workshop, or re-sell tools provided for running a workshop to make a one-off large revenue. As a result, this person gets unemployed again and loses his/her income source. The new approach seeks to eliminate such irresponsibility by applying conditionality via the social contract to employment and entrepreneurship support subsidies. In this example, a subsidy beneficiary will be obliged to run his/her workshop after getting a subsidy. The khakim's assistants will monitor the satisfaction of a given condition by visiting the workshop for up to six months. This approach would prevent the unemployment of the beneficiary. If the workshop faces any problems, the khakim assistants will also have an opportunity to assist the beneficiary in resolving the issue.

To conclude, the Strategy aims is to improve the efficiency of all social protection programs and further strengthen the state support provided to the population. The adoption of this Decree again shows the central position of human dignity and the people's intreset in the Republic of Uzbekistan. At the same time, it emphasizes that social protection is of priorities of the state policy. The Strategy clearly defines the medium- and long-term goals in social protection, which creates opportunities for cooperation with international organizations and institutions, allowing to attract their technical and expert support in further strengthening the social protection system in Uzbekistan.