Digitalisation of Registries and Social Protection Service Delivery Chain
By Gabriela Perin and Krista Joosep Alvarenga, International Policy Centre for Inclusive Growth (IPC-IG)
Social protection digitalisation embedded in e-governance, ID, data, and information management systems
Various types of social protection registries (databases) and their management information systems (MIS) as well as advancements in data management fuel the usage of digital tools for social protection (Ohlenburg 2022). From here, many further innovations spring forth.
Registries for social protection are often situated among wider government digitalisation, interoperability, and e-governance initiatives. One of the most important aspects supporting interoperability, e-governance and digitalisation is a unique identifier. It is an identifier that is guaranteed to be unique among all identifiers for a specific purpose. In case of social protection, the unique identifier helps to identify the specific person, track delivered services, settle claims, etc. For examples, countries such as Estonia, digitalisation of all government services (including social protection services) is close to 100 per cent. The main enabler of this, besides existence of information and communication technologies, is a national ID, which is the unique identifier. Estonia went even a step further as not only does everyone possess a unique identifier, but the national ID system is also high tech. The physical ID card is combined with a digital signature that enables Estonians to pay taxes, access banking services, vote or access and do procedures regarding their healthcare and social security online (CNBC 2019).
Brazil has been building its Cadastro Unico (Unified Registry) since 2001 and today tens of programmes use its database (WWP 2017) (Carmo Direito et al 2016). By 2020, 14 million families benefitted from the main flagship social protection programme that uses the Cadastro Unico. The numbers of beneficiaries exponentially increased during Covid-19. However, one limiting factors of connecting the Cadastro Unico database to other databases in the country is a missing national unique identifier, although the Individual Taxpayer Registry (CPF) number was used during the Covid-19 pandemic to check eligibility of millions of potentially vulnerable people to expand to them the emergency cash transfer, Auxílio Emergencial. The usage of the CPF did not go without criticism, as some vulnerable segments of the society would have needed to solicit such a number (World Bank 2021).
The other enabler of digitalisation is advancements in data management. Data management is the practice of collecting, organizing, protecting, and storing an organization's data so it can be analysed for decisions. Registries (in other words, databases) collect, store, and organise information on beneficiaries or potential beneficiaries of social protection programmes. The information collected may be individual or household characteristics, such as age, gender, nationality or the value and frequency of payments. Registries are also wider government registries, such as tax, assets, civil databases, health system databases, etc. The unique identifiers can be the link between all these databases. In Estonia, public data follows a principle of “only once”, meaning that if a piece of information, such as birth of a child is recorded, this is done once and the information is usable across databases, as the child would be allocated a unique ID number. Using a central registry, public authorities can retrieve this information, without having to contact the concerned persons again. This is especially useful for people applying for social protection benefits because they won’t have to fill the same forms with same information many times (WE Forum 2020). The child allowance benefit offer will be automatically triggered once the child’s birth is registered (Sotsiaalkindlustusamet 2022).
With data management, the repeated questions arise on who owns the data, how to ensure data privacy, how to ensure data quality and consistence across multiple systems. In Estonia, for example, privacy is enshrined in a set of laws and regulations. Estonian citizens are custodians of their personal data, such as health data and can even block access to it. They can check online who has looked at it and public employees are not allowed to look or use this data without reasonable justification (WE Forum 2020).
The core of digital social protection service delivery is a Management Information System (MIS). Many social protection programmes and systems are moving or have moved from paper-based systems to digital systems and the MIS is the interface that links the business process, information, beneficiaries, implementing staff and organisations. The MISs may accomplish processes such as registration of contributions, collection of contributions, gathering payroll information, assessing eligibility, collecting benefit requests, accounting services, benefit payments, case management, grievance complaints, and the monitoring and evaluation of operational processes (ILO et al 2021) while many of these processes were formerly not performed digitally.
Digital methods along the Social Protection Delivery Chain
There are several steps along the social protection delivery chain and different stages depending on the approach of each author. Figure 1 shows the business components that make up a digital social protection delivery chain. Outreach, assess, enrol and others in the column are business processes in social protection delivery chain while one-stop-shop (the interface with beneficiaries), social and beneficiary registry and the third layer on payment systems and grievance platforms is the place where information/data is shared between different databases and programmes (Grunfeld and Ruggia-Frick 2022).
Figure 1
Source: Grunfeld and Ruggia-Frick 2022.
The first step in the delivery chain is the outreach and it begins with clearly communicating people about the existence of a social protection programme, who is eligible to it and how to register. It involves carefully explaining how the whole process works: how are they going to register, what type of information will be asked, which documentation would be necessary to present, how they would be notified in case of potential acceptance or decline of eligibility or enrolment and more (Grunfeld and Ruggia-Frick, 2022). Outreach mechanisms, platforms, and campaigns can benefit from using digital technologies by increasing the visibility of a programme by communicating their existence in a large scale so that more individuals can know about it. In Paraguay, for example, the government used WhatsApp to disseminate information about its main social protection programme Tekoporã and 80% of recipients affirmed they had shared the content to other people through WhatsApp groups (Miranda et al 2021).
Inside the assessment, there is the collection of personal information and documentation to register the individual for potential eligibility for social protection programmes. It normally involves some of these activities: the application of a questionnaire, requirement to present supporting documents, interviews, and home visits to determine the eligibility for the programme (Grunfeld and Ruggia-Frick, 2022). Using digital tools such as tablets to collect the information can speed up the process and facilitate the importation of data into an online system. In Turkiye, this process is done by a social assistance inspection officer who visits the households and by the time the application is completed, a socioeconomic profile is generated in the Integrated Social Assistance Service Information System (ISAS) linking datasets from several institutions to check for inconsistencies in the information collected (Republic of Turkey, 2015).
After assessing the needs and conditions of registrants to determine their eligibility for the social programme, there’s the enrolment step which involves: the identification of beneficiaries, targeting, evaluation of eligibility criteria and selection (Ohlenburg 2022). Digital social or beneficiary registries are key tools and may facilitate the enrolment process for social protection programmes in the identification of beneficiaries. In the quick spread of Covid-19, the use of existing information sources was a quick strategic response for some countries that didn’t have robust registries available and limited time and resources. That’s the case of Togo’s Novissi programme that used existing voter registry database to identify possible beneficiaries, in addition to request supplementary information (Debenedetti, 2021). The updated data included a self-reported information on voter’s occupation to identify informal sector workers and allowed the implementation of this programme in only 10 days (Ohlenburg 2022).
The provision of benefits and/or payments for social protection programmes are done in the format of vouchers, goods, services and especially in cash. Using information and communication technologies in this stage to digitalise payments may be a safer option due to the risks of street robbery and assault at times. It can also increase the efficiency in delivering the benefits. The Covid-19 boosted some innovative measures, such as the use of digital payments through mobile money and electronic vouchers using/pre-paid cards (Ohlenburg 2022). In Togo, the Novissi programme paid a monthly benefit of USD52 for women and USD44 for men provided every 15 days for 3 months through mobile money and the gap between the announcement and first payment was nine days (Hammad et al 2021).
Another delivery stage is the monitoring and managing of the beneficiaries’ operations. The use of digitalized registries may facilitate monitoring and managing since the updates are automated and databases become increasingly interlinked, as is the case in Turkiye’s ISAS. In Argentina and Uruguay, some programmes’ grievance and redress mechanisms use chatbots and online complaint forms (Ohlenburg 2022).
References
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