An ATM vandalized during protests in Lebanon. (Anwar Amro/AFP)
BEIRUT — Financing for the government ration card program, which was passed by Parliament in June 2021 and is meant to assist vulnerable families in Lebanon, “has not been secured yet,” the spokesperson for caretaker Social Affairs Minister Hector Hajjar confirmed to L’Orient Today Monday.
Here’s what we know:
• The government had aimed to launch two similar cash assistance programs for needy families: one — the Emergency Social Safety Net (ESSN) program — funded via a World Bank loan and targeting the country’s poorest families, and another — the so-called “ration card” — that would have gone to assist other needy families who did not meet the criteria for the World Bank-funded one.
• While Lebanese officials had hoped to get additional funding from the World Bank for the ration card, the bank had told the ministry in March that securing the ration card funding would hinge on the implementation of three conditions, including implementing the ESSN program for the poorest families in Lebanon “with seriousness and transparency, commencing the process of paying the registered families and the Lebanese government’s contribution in the assistance program funding.”
• The cash from the $246 million ESSN program “DAEM,” was approved by the World Bank in January 2021 and the disbursement of payments started to be paid out to registered people in March. The program aims to reach 150,000 households in total, with monthly payments of $25 per household plus $20 per family member, capped at six individuals.
• The funding for the government ration card, a separate program that is meant to pay $556 million cash, “has not been secured” yet. Hajjar added Monday that “the loan by the WB is conditional on a number of demands that we have not been able to implement until now."
• The spokesperson told L’Orient Today that the ministry has been “waiting for WB's feedback since the end of April,” but nothing materialized thus far.
• Some 584,245 households have registered for the “DAEM” program, with more than two million individuals seeking to benefit from the cash assistance, according to the government’s IMPACT Open Data website. A total of 61,461 households are receiving DAEM payments to date, while others are still pending review by social workers to make sure they meet the criteria. Most of those registered work in the private sector and belong to the age group 35-64, according to the website’s data.