The First Kenya Social Protection Conference Week took place at the Kenyatta International Conference Centre (KICC), Nairobi from January 27 to 30, 2015. The theme of the conference was “Enhancing Synergy in Social Protection Delivery”. The event brought together representatives from Government line ministries and agencies, social protection experts, development partners, civil society representatives, academicians, researchers, beneficiaries and caregivers. The conference featured over 300 participants and 50 speakers from different countries. It offered a platform for interactive and deliberate discussions on the various issues that guide and affect social protection delivery and the growing opportunities for social protection in Kenya and Africa, more generally. It is notable that His Excellency, Hon. Uhuru Kenyatta, CGH, President and Commander in Chief of the Defence Forces of the Republic of Kenya, officially opened the conference which accorded it high standing on social development discourse in the country. The Cabinet Secretary, of the then Ministry of Social Security and Services (MLSSS), Hon. Kazungu Kambi, officially closed the conference.
The overall objective of the conference was to provide social protection stakeholders an opportunity to interact and learn from national and international experiences with a view to contributing to future programming while enhancing networking and coordination of social protection initiatives and interventions.
Recommendations
(i) Coordination: There is a need for a coordinated approach among the different players - Government, CSOs, Community Based Organizations (CBOs) and Faith Based Organizations (FBOs), at both national and county levels to streamline coordination of policies and programmes, and to avoid duplication and wastage of resources.
(ii) Targeting: it is critical that targeting of beneficiaries is undertaken in a manner that minimizes inclusion and exclusion errors. Validation of beneficiaries should be done while building and strengthening the complaints and grievance mechanisms.
(iii) Complementarity: there is a need to link different social protection measures in order to bring synergy and coordination in the delivery systems.
(iv) Graduation: it is critical for social protection programmes to plan for graduation or exit strategies as appropriate. This could involve moving beneficiaries to other forms of
support depending on their situations. Currently, there are no structures in place for such transitions to be effected.
(v) Use of Information Communication Technology (ICT): implementing agencies should embrace and make use of ICT to increase efficiency of the programmes including automation of registration processes and transfer of funds to the beneficiaries. The use of the single registry and biometric systems would enhance accountability and transparency.
(vi) Harmonized M&E activities: develop a harmonized M&E framework to allow broader reporting and sharing of data within the sector.
Download Social Protection Conference 2015 Report (PDF, 5.4MB)