Senegal - Social Protection National Strategy (SNPS)

The government of Senegal has elaborated by the end of 2005 a Social Protection National Strategy in the framework of the national Strategy to Reduce Poverty (SRP). As a member of the technical committee, STEP in Senegal has participated actively and includes its interventions in the framework of this strategy.

Through this strategy, the government of Senegal wants to reduce the impact of the shocks, which directly threaten the life of the populations by helping the households to manage better the risks and by supporting the access of the most vulnerable substratum of the population to basic social services. One of the objectives of SNPS is to extend social protection instruments by raising the cover rate in sickness insurance of less than 20% today to 50% of the population by 2015.

Two major projects, supported by STEP-Senegal have to contribute to the reach the objective fixed by SNPS. The objective is to set up a social protection regime for the workers of the agricultural sector through Agro-Sylvo-Partoral Orientation Law and a regime of health insurance for the workers of the road transport sector.

The Senegalese government has engaged itself to support these two initiatives that aim to cover more than five million people for the agro-sylvo-pastoral regime and about 400.000 people for the workers of the road transport sector.

STEP in Senegal also participates to « The coordination network between the actors of the development of healthcare mutual organizations in Africa » which is a network to share experiences, capacities and information about the development of healthcare mutual organizations in West and Central Africa. For this occasion, STEP-Senegal participates in the “national framework of cooperation” which facilitates the gathering of national actors with a common objective: the development of healthcare mutual organizations, micro-insurance and other innovative mechanisms to increase the access to health care.