The Role of Social Protection Policies in Enhancing Climate Resilience

The document examines how social protection—comprising non-contributory assistance, contributory insurance, and labour-market interventions—can mitigate the economic shocks of climate change in Africa. It highlights the African Risk Capacity (ARC) for sovereign risk pooling and Ethiopia's Productive Safety Net Program (PSNP) as key models for resilience. The author emphasizes that while climate change threatens to push 130 million people into poverty, leveraging multilateral funds like the Loss and Damage Fund and Green Climate Fund can finance the necessary social protection systems to protect the continent's most vulnerable.

• Climate change poses a severe threat to African development, with the potential to push over 130 million people into poverty and undermine the African Union's (AU) goal for member states to reach middle-income status by 2063.
• Social protection coverage in Africa is significantly lower than the global average, with less than 17.4% of the population covered by at least one benefit, compared to just under half of the global population.
• The African Risk Capacity (ARC) Insurance Company Limited (ARC Ltd) provides sovereign-level index insurance to 30 countries, reducing contingent funds for drought response by 50% through the diversification of losses. However, its effectiveness is limited because only 39 AU member states have signed the ARC Establishment Agreement.
• Ethiopia's Productive Safety Net Program (PSNP) serves as a model for climate-resilient social protection, supporting 10 million beneficiaries by providing cash or food in exchange for work on water and soil conservation and other infrastructure projects.
• Africa faces a massive financing gap for climate-related economic damages, with the African Development Bank estimating a need for $290–440 billion between 2020 and 2030.
• Multilateral climate funds, specifically the Green Climate Fund, the Global Environment Facility (GEF), and the newly launched Loss and Damage Fund, are identified as essential mechanisms to finance social protection pilot programmes and systems across the continent.

APA

MC LEAN, J. (2024). The Role of Social Protection Policies in Enhancing Climate Resilience. South African Institute of International Affairs. https://saiia.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/SAIIA_PB_296_SocialProtectionPolicies.pdf

Chicago

MC LEAN, JORDAN. The Role of Social Protection Policies in Enhancing Climate Resilience. South African Institute of International Affairs, 2024. https://saiia.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/SAIIA_PB_296_SocialProtectionPolicies.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=MC LEAN |first1=JORDAN |title=The Role of Social Protection Policies in Enhancing Climate Resilience |publisher=South African Institute of International Affairs |date=June 2024 |url=https://saiia.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/SAIIA_PB_296_SocialProtectionPolicies.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{mclean2024role, author = {MC LEAN, JORDAN}, title = {{The Role of Social Protection Policies in Enhancing Climate Resilience}}, institution = {South African Institute of International Affairs}, year = {2024}, month = jun, url = {https://saiia.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/SAIIA_PB_296_SocialProtectionPolicies.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }