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• Doro: No more duplication as govt shifts from palliatives to poverty graduation
• First Lady: Vulnerable households must move from temporary relief to self-reliance
Federal Government on Wednesday unveiled a new national social protection architecture designed to end duplication in poverty interventions, identify vulnerable households through a unified database and track beneficiaries until they graduate from poverty into economic self-reliance.
The new architecture, anchored by the $1 billion Household Prosperity and Empowerment Social Protection Project (HOPE-SP), marks a major shift in the government’s approach to social protection—from distributing temporary relief to systematically identifying, supporting and monitoring households along a defined pathway out of poverty.
Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Reduction, Bernard Doro, unveiled the framework at the State House Banquet Hall, Abuja, alongside four other initiatives aimed at strengthening Nigeria’s humanitarian and poverty reduction response.
The initiatives are the One-Humanitarian-One Poverty Response System (OHOPRS), Emergency Cash Transfer Programme, Federal Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Reduction Ministerial Blueprint and Humanity First Magazine.
Speaking at the event themed “From Palliatives to Pathways,” First Lady Oluremi Tinubu said the new interventions were designed to ensure that vulnerable Nigerians did not remain permanently dependent on government assistance.
She said HOPE-SP would combine immediate stabilisation assistance with interventions aimed at putting vulnerable households on a sustainable path towards recovery, empowerment and self-reliance.
“The first initiative, the Household Prosperity and Empowerment Social Protection Project, is an important step toward strengthening how to identify and respond to vulnerable households facing various challenges by listening to their specific needs before taking action.
“It is designed to provide immediate stabilization assistance while placing the households on a pathway to recovery, empowerment and self-reliance,” she said.
The First Lady said the initiative had become necessary as the economic reforms of the President Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration continued to reshape the economy, noting that many families still required support despite ongoing efforts to establish the foundations for sustainable growth and shared prosperity.
“Under the leadership of His Excellency, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, GCFR, our nation is implementing far-reaching reforms to strengthen the economy, lay a solid foundation for sustainable growth, and shared prosperity.
“As these reforms continue to take effect, we must recognize that, given the size of our population and available resources, many families still face challenges and require our collective support,” she said.
She said the One-Humanitarian-One Poverty Response System would provide a coordinated national platform for humanitarian emergencies, social protection and poverty reduction, while eliminating duplication among government interventions.
According to her, the system would operate through unified national registries that would enable government to identify poor and vulnerable households, provide appropriate assistance and track their progress towards prosperity.
The Emergency Cash Transfer Programme, she added, would provide rapid financial support to households affected by economic shocks, while the Ministerial Blueprint would translate the administration’s humanitarian and poverty reduction priorities into measurable actions.
She also described the Humanity First Magazine as an avenue for documenting the experiences of Nigerians whose lives had been transformed through government interventions.
Doro, explaining the rationale behind the new architecture, said the government was moving away from a system where ministries, departments and agencies operated separate social intervention programmes and databases without sufficient coordination.
He said the fragmentation had created a situation where some beneficiaries could access multiple government interventions while other vulnerable households remained unidentified or unsupported.
According to him, the new system would therefore place the household, rather than individual programmes, at the centre of social protection.
“The objective is to move from programmes to households, and from counting beneficiaries to measuring impact,” he said.
Doro said vulnerable households would be identified, their specific needs assessed and the appropriate interventions deployed before their progress was monitored through what he described as a “poverty graduation pathway.”
Under the system, he said beneficiaries would not simply receive assistance and disappear from government records. Their progress would be monitored from identification and intervention through economic inclusion, eventual exit from poverty and entry into a growth register.
The minister said the architecture would be supported by unified data, digital delivery infrastructure, new financing arrangements and real-time poverty intelligence.
He said the One-Humanitarian-One Poverty Response System would provide a single window through which government could coordinate humanitarian and poverty reduction interventions, ending the practice of different agencies maintaining separate registers and data centres.
Doro disclosed that existing databases would be integrated into a unified platform anchored on the National Social Register, which currently contains about 20 million households.
He said the system would allow government to know not only who was receiving assistance but also whether the intervention was producing measurable improvements in the household’s economic circumstances.
To strengthen evidence-based policymaking, the minister announced plans to establish a National Poverty Intelligence Lab, which would provide data and analysis to guide government interventions.
He said the success of the new social protection architecture would no longer be measured by the volume of food, cash or other materials distributed, but by the number of households protected from economic shocks, economically included and ultimately moved out of poverty.
Doro said the new approach was intended to move Nigeria from reactive relief to anticipatory social protection, and from managing poverty to actively reducing it.
Minister of Budget and Economic Planning, Atiku Bagudu, said the success of the initiative would depend on a whole-of-government approach involving federal, state and local governments, development partners and other stakeholders.
Bagudu said the administration’s ambition to build a $1 trillion economy by 2030 must be accompanied by deliberate measures to ensure that economic opportunities reached Nigerians at the grassroots.
He cited the administration’s ward development initiative covering the country’s 8,809 wards, saying it was designed to identify the factors driving poverty and exclusion at community level and transform the wards into centres of prosperity and inclusion.
The minister said the government was also increasing budgetary attention to peace, security and social protection to prevent hardworking Nigerians from being pushed into poverty by domestic and global economic shocks.
He noted that international developments, including the Russia-Ukraine war and instability in the Middle East, could have consequences for household incomes and economic stability in Nigeria.
Bagudu said Nigeria already had substantial resources committed to social protection and poverty reduction, including a World Bank portfolio of about $6 billion, but argued that better coordination was required to maximise the impact of such investments.
He stressed that the challenge was not necessarily the absence of resources but ensuring that programmes and resources available at the federal, state and local levels were properly aligned and efficiently deployed.
Borno State Governor, Babagana Zulum, commended the Federal Government for the initiative, describing it as important to addressing the underlying causes of vulnerability.
Zulum, whose state has faced prolonged humanitarian challenges caused by insurgency, said sustainable peace and security could not be achieved through emergency interventions alone.
He stressed the need to address poverty, inequality and other socioeconomic conditions that could expose individuals and communities to insecurity and instability.
The governor also called for continued research into issues surrounding identity and national security, while congratulating the Federal Government and the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Reduction on the rollout.
The First Lady commended Doro and his team for developing the new initiatives, expressing optimism that they would transform Nigeria’s humanitarian response from temporary assistance into sustainable pathways to resilience, self-reliance and prosperity.
“I commend the Honourable Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Reduction, Dr. Bernard M. Doro and his team for these initiatives that will transform our humanitarian endeavours from temporary assistance to lasting pathways that promote resilience, self-reliance, prosperity and a dignified life for every Nigerian,” she said.
The government said the new architecture was expected to strengthen accountability, reduce duplication and provide a clearer measure of whether social protection interventions were actually improving the lives of vulnerable Nigerians.
