The World Bank has allocated an extra $270 million in financing for the Crisis-Resilient Social Protection (CRISP) program, aimed at bolstering the establishment of an adaptive and resilient social protection system capable of responding to crises.
The proposed Additional Financing (AF) will allocate an extra credit of $270 million to the Crisis-Resilient Social Protection program. The original project, which commenced in March 2021, is scheduled to conclude by the end of June 2025. With the proposed AF, the project’s closure date will be extended by a year, until the end of June 2026.
The overall Program scope remains unchanged for both the original project and the AF. However, there have been revisions to the Government Program’s expenditure supported by Program for Results (PforR) Financing (both Original and Additional). These changes are attributed to incorporating actual expenditures for fiscal years 2020-21, 2021-22, and 2022-23, adjustments due to a 75 percent increase in the exchange rate, and the inclusion of the budget for fiscal year 2025-26 in the expenditure framework due to the extension of the project’s closing date.
Despite these adjustments, the overall PforR financing constitutes 9 percent of the government’s program.
Official documents reveal that this AF will contribute to Result Areas 1 and 3 of the parent project. Disbursement Linked Indicators (DLIs) proposed under the AF will encompass longer-term policy actions regarding the Benazir Income Support Program (BISP) programs and the National Socio-Economic Registry (NSER).
Under Result Area 1, the proposed results aim to:
- Implement recertification protocols to ensure predictability in program exit and entry for BISP programs during future recertifications.
- Institutionalize an indexation mechanism for the base cash transfer program (Kafaalat) benefits to prevent erosion in purchasing power and protect against the impacts of economic shocks.
- Ensure accessibility to potential Kafaalat beneficiaries in the NSER who are not currently enrolled.
- Extend/expands MELA and program touchpoints from Tehsil to Union Council level to improve accessibility.
- Adopt NSER as the agreed targeting mechanism nationwide and develop a technology-supported mechanism to facilitate two-way data exchange with other programs.
Under Result Area 3, the proposed actions support measures to correct the current overlap of federal and provincial cash transfer (CCT) programs and prevent future overlap, including the gradual takeover by the provinces of Punjab and Sindh, through their own resources, of the services currently provided by federal health and nutrition-focused CCT.
Official documents further reveal that Pakistan’s poverty reduction has slowed amid recent shocks, while growth has remained volatile and slow. Despite significant progress in poverty reduction between 2001 and 2018, with over 47 million Pakistanis rising out of poverty, rapid poverty reduction has not fully translated into improved socioeconomic conditions. Human capital outcomes have remained poor, with high levels of stunting at 38 percent and learning poverty at 78 percent.
