The Nigerian Government has disbursed Monetary support to 9,925 beneficiaries across the 44 Local government areas of Kano State in North Western part of the country.
The Minister of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management, Social Development programmes, Hajiya Sadiya Farouk stated this during distribution of Grant for Vulnerable Groups, Digitised Payment of the Conditional Cash Transfer, CCT and Sensitisation of Community Stakeholders of the National Home-Grown School Feeding Programme, NHGSFP in Kano State.
The Minister said since the inception of President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration in 2015, when it inherited a National Poverty Incidence level averaging 70%, the Nigerian Government has paid more attention to generating solutions to address the plight of the poor and vulnerable in the Country.
According to her, this informed the decision to initiate the National Social Investment Programme, NSIP in 2015 as a strategy for poverty reduction and enhancing social inclusion among people especially the women in rural areas.
“NSIP has been acclaimed by many to be the largest and most ambitious social protection programme in Africa, and it is currently attracting many partnerships including even from international development partners,” she said.
Farouk stated that since the commencement of implementing the NSIP in 2016, it has impacted positively on many lives of the poor and vulnerable in Nigeria.
“I have personally witnessed the life-changing experiences on people who, hitherto, lived below the poverty line and those that are vulnerable to shocks, but are now living better lives.
“Today, we are in Kano state to flag-off the Grant for Vulnerable Groups programme, GVG in Kano State, a project which was introduced in 2020, first as Grant for Rural Women (GRW), to sustain the social inclusion agenda of President Buhari’s administration. It is consistent with his deliberate National agenda of lifting 100 million Nigerians out of poverty in 10 years,” she streesed.
She said the GVG was designed to provide a one-off grant, a cash grant of N20,000.00, to some of the poorest and most vulnerable Nigerians in rural and peri-urban areas across the 36 States of the Federation and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
According the t Minister, President Muhammadu Buhari, through his deliberate social inclusion agenda has directed that 70% of these beneficiaries must be women, while the remaining 30% is for the youths.
He also directed that, at least 15% of the total number of beneficiaries must specifically be allocated to citizens with special needs, including Persons with Disability, PWDs and Senior Citizens in the State.
“It is on this note that we encourage the Kano State government to note and emulate this gesture and extend similar interventions to amplify social inclusion through it’s policies, programmes and projects. the target of this Cash Grant project is to increase income and productive assets of the target beneficiaries. “
She said the importance of the exercise was to create room for reliable, transparent and accessible database for seamless disbursements.
“In addition to the above, we are here to flag-off the National Sensitisation Exercise for the National Home Grown School Feeding Programme,” she added.
Confidence Okwuchi
