Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-5xszh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-29T10:34:34.850Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

8 - New Approaches to the Targeting of Social Protection Programs

from Part Two - Poverty Alleviation Policies and Programs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 October 2015

Asep Suryahadi
Affiliation:
SMERU Research Institute
Wenefrida Widyanti
Affiliation:
SMERU Research Institute
Daniel Suryadarma
Affiliation:
Australian National University, Canberra
Sudarno Sumarto
Affiliation:
SMERU Research Institute
Get access

Summary

INTRODUCTION

The Indonesian experience of implementing social protection programs during the economic crisis of the late 1990s and also during the post-crisis period shows that targeting in programs of this kind is always difficult. As a consequence, social protection programs always suffer from the problems of undercoverage and leakage at the same time. Both problems cause these programs to become less effective and less efficient than they have potential to be (Sumarto et al. 2002). Hence there is a clear need to improve targeting at two levels simultaneously: the geographic and the individual levels. This paper describes attempts to develop more effective targeting tools than those already in use in Indonesia.

POVERTY MAPPING: A TOOL FOR BETTER GEOGRAPHIC TARGETING

The Advantages of Small-area Poverty Mapping

Ideally, geographic targeting should be based on a description of poverty incidence and other indicators of economic welfare in small areas or at low administrative levels. It is here that poverty mapping offers advantages. Detailed poverty maps of small areas can provide benefits to help address many of the shortcomings of aggregate poverty profiles and can greatly enhance and sharpen poverty analysis.

First, small-area poverty maps can obviously reveal the variations in local poverty levels. Almost all countries in the world have regions that are well off and others that have lagged behind. Such differences are often obscured in national-level statistics, a problem that is particularly critical in large and heterogeneous countries like Indonesia. Second, poverty maps can improve the targeting of interventions, which means that resources can be used more effectively. Poverty maps have the potential to reduce the risk that benefits may be leaked from a program to non-poor households. Similarly, they can also reduce the risk of undercoverage, that is, the possibility that poor households will be missed by a program.

Third, poverty maps can help governments to state their policy goals objectively. If allocation decisions are based on observed geographic poverty data rather than on subjective rankings of regions, the transparency and credibility of government decision-making is increased. Poverty maps can therefore help limit the influence of special interests in allocation decisions. This is particularly relevant in the context of currently decentralized Indonesia.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute
Print publication year: 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×