Social Protection

Intro

The social protection sector has the potential to address all forms of malnutrition through systematic integration of nutrition-specific and nutrition-sensitive activities.

Taking nutrition-specific and nutrition-sensitive actions will improve the targeting of social protection to those most in need, in ways that will see enhanced return on investment both in short term health outcomes and longer term human capital contributions to productivity, economic growth, and sustainable development.

Why

Why the sector needs to get involved

• Addressing malnutrition through social protection programs is a powerful tool for improving the lives of vulnerable populations. By reaching those who are affected by food insecurity, poverty, and inadequate diets, the social protection sector can provide comprehensive support to improve their nutrition status.
• Malnutrition, in all its forms, remains a major driver of poverty; and poverty is equally a driver of malnutrition. Interventions to prevent malnutrition thus also reinforce poverty reduction and are among the most cost-effective interventions¹⁷.
• Integrating nutrition indicators and outcomes into the social protection system will contribute to poverty reduction and the need for social protection expenditure in the future.
• Social protection plays a significant role in growth and development. By raising household incomes, social protection sets local economic cycles in motion. This productive potential of social protection can be enhanced through agricultural and other training programmes, making important contributions to livelihoods, therefore contributing to the improvement of nutrition outcomes.
• Human capital development leads to fewer poor and very poor households to support, and helps reduce intergenerational poverty and inequality - therefore breaking the intergenerational cycle of malnutrition. 

Key asks

• Ensure social protection safety nets integrate nutrition status within the households as one of the criteria to determine poor and very poor households, particularly the nutrition indicators of children under 5 years of age.
• Include as part of the routine guidance provided to poor and very poor household surveys are awareness raising messages related to healthy and nutritious food and practices.
• Advocate for programs that have evidence of positive impacts on reducing stunting, wasting, and reduction of micronutrient deficiencies in children and women.
• Emphasize the importance of including in future evaluations of social protection programmes indicators that cover diet and nutrition outcomes.