According to the International Labour Organisation (ILO), more than three-quarters of the world still lack adequate social protection programmes, and more than four billion people are uninsured. As a result, people are often more vulnerable to poverty, economic loss, and social exclusion.
Although social protection has played an important role in many states for decades, the idea of requiring a minimum level of social protection for every citizen in Nepal is gaining traction just recently, and the Nepal government has shown interest and recognition in order to protect citizens from various traumas and reduce poverty.
Article 34 of Nepal’s constitution guarantees social security as a fundamental right to reduce poverty and risk. The Right to Employment Act, 2018, has been enacted to put into effect the fundamental rights guaranteed by the constitution. The government has implemented social security rules based on contributions for equitable labour relations, poverty reduction, and industrial stability, according to the Social Security Act, 2018.
The Nepal government has implemented various lifecycle-based social security schemes. It has implemented global social security schemes, such as early childhood education and health care, social security schemes based on contributions at active age, and pensions after retirement in old age.
This is a significant achievement for trade unions after a long struggle for their members’ dignified work and secure lives. Besides trade unions, NGOs, national and international, have played an important role in this achievement.
This writer has got a chance to get involved in one of such contributions made jointly by trade unions and NGOs. The experience gained has proved that the involvement of different stakeholders such as the unions and NGOs can be imperative in improving social protection or social security systems in Nepal.
The project
The Social Protection and Public Finance Management (SP&PFM) project is undertaken to collaborate within the framework of the EU Action Programme, Synergies in Social Protection and Public Finance Management. Belgian NGO, We Social Movements (WSM), coordinates the involvement of civil society and trade unions for Nepal on behalf of the Global Coalition for Social Protection Floors (GCSPF) with a goal to strengthen national social protection systems through technical support, explorative research, and capacity development, focusing on public financial management systems, budgeting, and financing of social protection.
For Nepal, there are two main local partners, the International Trade Union Confederation – Nepal Affiliated Council (ITUC-NAC), Social Protection Civil Society Network (SPCSN), and Children-Women in Social Service and Human Rights (CWISH). While leads have been determined for certain activities between the ITUC-NAC and SPCSN/CWISH, the action very much remains a joint undertaking and responsibility, fostering better understanding and collaboration between trade unions and civil society and consequently regarding contributory and non-contributory social security.
Working model in Nepal
In Nepal, this action focuses primarily on the social protection floors: child allowances, universal health care, old age, and the active population. The project is piloting civil society involvement in two local governments, Helambu (Sindhupalchok, Bagmati) and Kalaiya (Bara, Madhesh), to examine local governance of social protection and encourage the CSOs to be actively involved in the processes. The ITUC-NAC focuses on the newly created contributory social security system, both at the national level to include informal workers and at the provincial level, looking at contributions for informal workers, such as those in the construction industry, and also on the enrollment of private school employees.
In 2022, 76 CSOs and trade union leaders were trained to promote social protection, including steering committee meetings and learning exchange between Cambodia and Nepal to build an inclusive national network on social protection. Through traditional and social media, over 725,000 citizens were made more aware of social protection schemes with a right-based approach. However, challenges remained with Covid and dengue fever restrictions, elections and changes in government.
The project’s first important component gathers stakeholders from civil society and trade unions and creates spaces where various aspects of social protection floors and public finance management can be discussed and analysed, with the goal of improving understanding, building consensus, and finally joint advocacy. As a result, the project brings together and involves over 240 stakeholders from international and local CSOs, as well as trade unions, academics, journalists, and social protection practitioners, each bringing elements of SPF and PFM: representing target groups such as the active population, child rights groups or the elderly, people living with disabilities, adaptive social protection, access to health, and so on.
Once these stakeholders are gathered, the project aims to increase capacities of understanding for either basic or more advanced SPF and PFM issues, hence workshops and seminars are organised, both at the national and local levels, especially with Nepal’s newly federalised structure.
After the space offered to network, the training to better understand, and the joint advocacy, for CSOs and trade unions, it is also very important to promote a rights-based approach to the beneficiaries. Large-scale awareness with key messages is important not only to have people enrol and claim their individual rights but also collectively stress the importance of SPF and PFM.
The next steps once the space has been offered and issues have been better understood are building consensus and coming to joint positions, after which various stakeholders mobilise their members to publicly support demands, like through petitions or marches. Stakeholders also use their contacts, formal or informal, to approach policymakers and present these joint positions.
The way forward
Based on the project’s learning, it has been concluded that in order to ensure contribution-based and non-contribution-based social security, the Government of Nepal, constitutional bodies, diplomatic missions, development partners, civil society organisations, media persons, political parties, and all related bodies should do the following:
- A long-term institutional framework must be used to strengthen the social security system through long-term strategies.
- Contributory social security must remain mandatory, and all people should have access to rights-based social security. The Social Security Fund should cover informal workers and self-employed people.
- The development and implementation of social security schemes should be coordinated, and the Nepal government should prioritise social security issues as human rights issues.
- The government must ensure that trade unions, employers’ associations, and civil society are represented in all bodies involved in the design, monitoring, implementation, and evaluation of social security programmes.
- It must ensure that individuals and organisations have the right to seek, obtain, and provide information about social security programmes in an easy-to-understand manner.
- The national integrated social security framework should improve coordination between contributed and non-contributory social security schemes, and these schemes should ensure complementarities throughout the life cycle and be aware of overlapping.
- The government should ensure an equitable transition to reduce the impact of human activity on climate change.
- To aid recovery, reduce vulnerabilities, and prepare for future pandemics and crises like Covid, a combination of employment, labour market, and social security policies should be implemented.
- Social security programmes should address the life cycle of women and people with special needs (childhood, adolescence, adulthood, and old age).
- The Nepal government should improve service delivery capacity by ensuring strong coordination between the local and provincial levels, as well as various ministries and departments.
- Political parties should put their manifesto commitments on social security into action through policies and methods.
- The framework for integrated social security should be endorsed by the cabinet and implemented as soon as possible by the relevant bodies.
The continuous advocacy from the project contributed to the government of Nepal’s decision to revise the Prime Minister’s Employment Programme framework. Unions are putting pressure on the government and policymakers to change barriers in social security and labour laws.
Meanwhile, some promises made by the government are yet to be implemented. To ensure that they materialise on time, the project will continue and intensify its advocacy efforts.
