ILO data workshop in Belize supports development of national social protection strategy
Training part of roadmap to greater labour market resilience with support from Joint SDG Fund.
31 August 2023
As Belize recovers from the COVID-19 pandemic, national policymakers have called for better social protection data that are needed to enable the Government, workers and employers to build resilience to future shocks.
In response and with support from the Joint Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Fund Programme: Building a Resilient Belize through Universal, Adaptive and Sustainable Social Protection, the ILO Decent Work Team and Office for the Caribbean, in collaboration with the Government of Belize, recently conducted a social protection statistics workshop.
Geared to policymakers, the 25 July 2023 session was designed to strengthen their understanding of how a more coordinated and robust collection and management of social protection data can help to improve national policies and decision-making so that, among others, labour markets can reduce vulnerabilities to future health crises, climate change, and other threats.
Their enhanced capacity will also contribute to the development and implementation of an overall national social protection strategy, which is being developed through the Joint SDG Fund Programme implemented in partnership between the Government of Belize and the United Nations in Belize. It will also contribute to the data ecosystem mapping and reporting mechanism for the SDGs and other commitments, the country is implementing through the Ministry of Sustainable Development, Climate Change and Disaster Risk Management and the Statistical Institute of Belize (SIB), which is providing the platform for compiling data in one central location and via its data portals.
Featured presenters included Zhiming Yu, Social Protection Data Officer at ILO Headquarters in Geneva, Pilar Cariño, ILO Consultant and Joana Borges-Henriques, ILO Caribbean Specialist for Social Protection and Occupational Safety and Health. The session was facilitated by Pamela Bradley, ILO Caribbean Project Officer for Belize.
“Timely, reliable, accurate and comparable data are crucial for the formulation, implementation, monitoring, evaluation and impact assessment of efficient mechanisms to be built into the new national social protection strategy to ensure that Belize can effectively recover from crises with minimal disruptions to its socio-economic wellbeing,” said Joana Borges-Henriques. “It is only when a country brings all sources of data and actors together that it can realize what social protection programmes it is offering the population and make improvements to expand coverage.”
During his presentation on the ILO Social Security Inquiry and Developing National Systems on Social Protection Statistics, Zhiming Yu provided an in-depth overview on the advantages of compiling social protection data using a collaborative approach. “The goal of this exercise brings many institutions together to build national systems for social protection statistics instead of individually for better data integration,” he said.
Participants included over 70 representatives from more than 10 Government ministries; the Central Bank of Belize; the SIB; social partners including Belize Chamber of Commerce and Industry (BCCI) and the National Trade Union Congress of Belize (NTUCB); seven UN Agencies; non-governmental organizations (NGOs); academia; and the media.
They also benefited from a session by Pilar Cariño on the results of desk research to collect national information from official sources to develop social protection indicators such as the proportion of vulnerable persons covered by social protection systems. The research was conducted as an initial step to understand the social protection situation in Belize, inform the development of the national social protection strategy, contribute to the development of the National SDG Voluntary Report, and contribute to the World Social Protection Report (both to be published next year).
Following the workshop, the ILO will continue to provide training sessions and other forms of technical assistance to Government of Belize ministries and agencies so that they can effectively prepare, finalize and implement the national social protection strategy that will expand and deepen coverage.
Under the Joint SDG Fund Programme: Building a Resilient Belize through Universal, Adaptive and Sustainable Social Protection, the ILO is working with Government partners in Belize in collaboration with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the World Food Programme (WFP) to build on the consensus that social protection is a human right, and that a social protection floor (SPF) has the potential to provide a basic set of social rights and transfers for all in Belize. The Joint SDG Fund Programme supports a stronger, coordinated, integrated, shock-responsive, and resilient social protection system in Belize that reaches the most vulnerable, including women and children through the development of the national social protection strategy, inclusive of a SPF.
For more information, please visit the ILO Caribbean website.
In response and with support from the Joint Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Fund Programme: Building a Resilient Belize through Universal, Adaptive and Sustainable Social Protection, the ILO Decent Work Team and Office for the Caribbean, in collaboration with the Government of Belize, recently conducted a social protection statistics workshop.
Geared to policymakers, the 25 July 2023 session was designed to strengthen their understanding of how a more coordinated and robust collection and management of social protection data can help to improve national policies and decision-making so that, among others, labour markets can reduce vulnerabilities to future health crises, climate change, and other threats.
Their enhanced capacity will also contribute to the development and implementation of an overall national social protection strategy, which is being developed through the Joint SDG Fund Programme implemented in partnership between the Government of Belize and the United Nations in Belize. It will also contribute to the data ecosystem mapping and reporting mechanism for the SDGs and other commitments, the country is implementing through the Ministry of Sustainable Development, Climate Change and Disaster Risk Management and the Statistical Institute of Belize (SIB), which is providing the platform for compiling data in one central location and via its data portals.
Featured presenters included Zhiming Yu, Social Protection Data Officer at ILO Headquarters in Geneva, Pilar Cariño, ILO Consultant and Joana Borges-Henriques, ILO Caribbean Specialist for Social Protection and Occupational Safety and Health. The session was facilitated by Pamela Bradley, ILO Caribbean Project Officer for Belize.
“Timely, reliable, accurate and comparable data are crucial for the formulation, implementation, monitoring, evaluation and impact assessment of efficient mechanisms to be built into the new national social protection strategy to ensure that Belize can effectively recover from crises with minimal disruptions to its socio-economic wellbeing,” said Joana Borges-Henriques. “It is only when a country brings all sources of data and actors together that it can realize what social protection programmes it is offering the population and make improvements to expand coverage.”
During his presentation on the ILO Social Security Inquiry and Developing National Systems on Social Protection Statistics, Zhiming Yu provided an in-depth overview on the advantages of compiling social protection data using a collaborative approach. “The goal of this exercise brings many institutions together to build national systems for social protection statistics instead of individually for better data integration,” he said.
Participants included over 70 representatives from more than 10 Government ministries; the Central Bank of Belize; the SIB; social partners including Belize Chamber of Commerce and Industry (BCCI) and the National Trade Union Congress of Belize (NTUCB); seven UN Agencies; non-governmental organizations (NGOs); academia; and the media.
They also benefited from a session by Pilar Cariño on the results of desk research to collect national information from official sources to develop social protection indicators such as the proportion of vulnerable persons covered by social protection systems. The research was conducted as an initial step to understand the social protection situation in Belize, inform the development of the national social protection strategy, contribute to the development of the National SDG Voluntary Report, and contribute to the World Social Protection Report (both to be published next year).
Following the workshop, the ILO will continue to provide training sessions and other forms of technical assistance to Government of Belize ministries and agencies so that they can effectively prepare, finalize and implement the national social protection strategy that will expand and deepen coverage.
Under the Joint SDG Fund Programme: Building a Resilient Belize through Universal, Adaptive and Sustainable Social Protection, the ILO is working with Government partners in Belize in collaboration with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the World Food Programme (WFP) to build on the consensus that social protection is a human right, and that a social protection floor (SPF) has the potential to provide a basic set of social rights and transfers for all in Belize. The Joint SDG Fund Programme supports a stronger, coordinated, integrated, shock-responsive, and resilient social protection system in Belize that reaches the most vulnerable, including women and children through the development of the national social protection strategy, inclusive of a SPF.
For more information, please visit the ILO Caribbean website.