Over the last decade, many developing country governments have taken steps to digitize G2P payments. The COVID-19 pandemic provided sudden, and often much-needed, momentum to these initiatives.
According to the World Bank, nearly 2 billion new beneficiaries are receiving social assistance as a result of COVID-19 relief measures – 75 percent in the form of cash transfers – in over 200 countries and territories. Digital financial services have played a major role in this massive global scale up of G2P transfers within a few months’ time.
The G2P response to COVID-19 provides a once-in-a-generation window of opportunity to advance financial inclusion and women’s economic empowerment, locking in the gains from digital social assistance payments for broader, more sustainable development goals.
This is a very broad agenda. It requires understanding the current challenges from different perspectives, bringing together a wide range of domain experts and reaching a broad set of global and country-level stakeholders with evidence on what works and how.
To do this, G2P Learning Network partners created 6 thematic Working Groups with the objective of providing a forum for sharing research, country cases and policy guidance for organizations working to achieve common goals. Several working groups produced public reports or other outputs—click them to see more.
- Awareness, Communication, and Outreach: Coordinating Organization – MSC
- Exclusion: Coordinating Organization – Better Than Cash Alliance
- Responsible Practices: Coordinating Organization – Better Than Cash Alliance
- Agent Networks: Coordinating Organization – CGAP
- Onboarding: Coordinating Organization – CGAP
- Research and Monitoring: Coordinating Organization – IPA
- Targeting: Coordinating Organization – IPA