5-year FCDO-supported National Social Protection Program closes out with data and recommendations adopted by Adamawa , Anambra, Borno, Ekiti, Jigawa, Kaduna, Kano, Yobe & Zamfara states

The 5-year Better Assistance in Crises (BASIC) program closed out in Abuja last week, with high level representation from the Office of the Vice President of the Federation; Federal Ministries of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Reduction; Budget and Economic Planning; Health and Social Welfare; National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPSS); National Social Investment […]

The 5-year Better Assistance in Crises (BASIC) program closed out in Abuja last week, with high level representation from the Office of the Vice President of the Federation; Federal Ministries of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Reduction; Budget and Economic Planning; Health and Social Welfare; National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPSS); National Social Investment Agency; and Commissioners of line Ministries responsible for social protection from Adamawa, Anambra, Borno, Ekiti, Jigawa, Kaduna, Kano, Yobe and Zamfara, states. Development partners included FCDO; GIZ; UNICEF; and the World Bank. South Sahara Development Organisation (SSDO) led the CSO delegation of six leading Nigerian poverty non-profits. BASIC is funded by FCDO and anchored by CPAN, at Institute of Development Studies (IDS), Sussex. The development Research and Projects Center (dRPC), Nigeria’s leading think tank and accelerator NGO implemented BASIC in collaboration with the National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPSS).

The BASIC end of program close out workshop did not print and distribute reports and facts sheets produced over the life of the project. Rather, QR codes were shared with participants before hand and the forum was used to discuss recommendations and secure commitments of reform from officials representing state governments.

Commissioners; their representatives; and Directors of Social Investment State Offices at the workshop discussed and reflected on BASIC findings in group work sessions and pledged key commitments to implement new learnings upon returning to their states. Pledges included: 1) Mass mobilization and community engagement of stakeholders to increase awareness of the scope, coverage and benefits of state social assistance programs; 2) Leverage BASIC data on social assistance budget performance and collaborate with CSOs to defend and advocate for increases of social assistance budget lines in the 2026 budget defence and public hearings; 3) Strengthen Monitoring and tracking methodologies and tools of social assistance programs, using findings to improve program re-design; and 4) Appeal to the Federal Government to convene the National Council on Social Protection in 2025 for coordination of all state and national social protection programs.

As the BASIC program closes out it leaves behind on the dRPC’s website, a repository of Issue Briefs; Policy Briefs; Facts Sheets; Reports on Social Assistance Budget Performance by state covering the period 2021 to 2025. This is national resource for donor funded social protection advocacy projects such the European Union support for ANEEJ to tap into; for facts checking media to leverage; for students of public finance to learn from; and for uptake from policy makers. The dRPC-NIPSS studies on Crisis Trajectories should excite and perhaps worry analysts and scholars using anticipatory research methodologies for disaster management in Nigeria.

The BASIC program findings will be of value to the Federal Government of Nigeria, given government’s recent commitments to revise the National Social Protection Policy (2021); to relaunch school feeding programs; coupled with the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy pledge to expand the Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) programs beyond 15 million Nigerians which he made on October 29, 2025. BASIC’s contribution is unique in its focus on effective delivery mechanism to address intersecting crises and shocks as well its gender lenses and its identification of pathways used by Nigerians for sustained escape from poverty.