Revisiting Poverty Trends and the Role of Social Protection Systems in Africa during the COVID-19 Pandemic
Quantifying the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on poverty in Africa has been as difficult as predicting the path of the pandemic, mainly due to data limitations. The advent of new data sources, including national accounts and phone survey data, pr...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Working Paper |
| Language: | English English |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2022
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/099439009132230066/IDU0a252038a0259c04a26099f00ae922b7f52b3 http://hdl.handle.net/10986/38014 |
| Summary: | Quantifying the impact of the
COVID-19 pandemic on poverty in Africa has been as difficult
as predicting the path of the pandemic, mainly due to data
limitations. The advent of new data sources, including
national accounts and phone survey data, provides an
opportunity for a thorough reassessment of the impact of the
pandemic and the subsequent expansion of social protection
systems on the evolution of poverty in Africa. This paper
combines per capita gross domestic product growth from
national accounts with data from High-Frequency Phone
Surveys for several countries to estimate the net impact of
the pandemic on poverty. It finds that the pandemic
increased poverty in Africa by 1.5–1.7 percentage points in
2020, relatively smaller than early estimates and
projections. The paper also finds that countries affected by
fragility, conflict, and violence experienced the greatest
increases in poverty, about 2.1 percentage points in 2020.
Furthermore, the paper assesses and synthesizes empirical
evidence on the role that social protection systems played
in mitigating the adverse impact of the COVID-19 crisis in
Africa. It reviews social protection responses in various
African countries, mainly focusing on the impact of these
programs and effectiveness of targeting systems. Although
the evidence base on the protective role of social
protection programs during the pandemic remains scarce, the
paper highlights important findings on the impacts of these
programs while also uncovering some vulnerabilities in
social protection programming in Africa. Finally, the paper
draws important lessons related to the delivery, targeting,
and impact of various social protection programs launched in
Africa in response to the pandemic. |
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