Oxfam (15.12.2020) As 2020 draws to a close, the economic devastation caused by the COVID-19 pandemic shows no sign of abating. Without urgent action, global poverty and inequality will deepen dramatically. Hundreds of millions of people have already lost their jobs, gone further into debt or skipped meals for months. Research by Oxfam and Development Pathways shows that over 2 billion people have had no support from their governments in their time of need.

un.org (10.12.2020) The UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, slams the levels of financial support for children allocated by high-income countries during the pandemic as totally inadequate, in a child poverty report issued on Friday.

COVID-19 has affected the incomes of some health professionals by reducing demand for care and increasing expenditures for treatment preparedness. In a survey of 14 European countries, we found that most countries have incentivised substitutive e-health services to avoid loss of income.

worldbank (2020) The Sourcebook synthesizes real-world experiences and lessons learned of social protection delivery systems from around the world, with a particular focus on social and labor benefits and services. It takes a practical approach, seeking to address concrete “how-to” questions, including: How do countries deliver social protection benefits and services? How do they do so effectively and efficiently? How do they ensure dynamic inclusion, especially for the most vulnerable and needy?

worldbank.org (nov 2020) The unprecedented and ongoing scale-up of social protection responses to the COVID-19 pandemic dwarf the response to the Great Recession. But how are countries financing such scale-up efforts? This note lays out ten stylized findings from a rapid review of social protection financing sources in thirty-one countries, including in terms of composition between external and domestic resources, and specific modalities within each.

NBER (October 2020) This working paper examine trends in employment, earnings, and incomes over the last two decades in the United States, and how the safety net has responded to changing fortunes, including the shutdown of the economy in response to the Covid-19 Pandemic. The U.S. safety net is a patchwork of different programs providing in-kind as well as cash benefits and had many holes prior to the Pandemic. In addition, few of the programs are designed explicitly as automatic stabilizers.

European Commission (09.11.2020) The report analyses the progress towards the Europe 2020 target on reducing poverty and social exclusion, together with the latest social trends to watch, and presents the key structural social challenges in each Member State. However, following the COVID-19 pandemic that has swept across Europe in 2020, the report also focuses on the decisive action taken by Member States to protect employment, income and access to services through a variety of measures.

ILO (21.10.2020) This paper provides updated regional and global estimates of the costs and financing gaps for targets 1.3 and 3.8 of the SDGs relating to social protection and health care in 2020 and projections of incremental financial needs for reaching universal coverage in 2030. The paper analyses options for filling social protection financing gaps in developing countries during the crisis and beyond using domestic and external resources, including the strengthening and expansion of contributory systems. The analysis incorporates the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.

cabri-sbo.org (25.03.2020)

To promote the use of electronic payment tools the Western Africa Central Bank (BCEAO) is providing more flexible measures to open a mobile money and making transfers between people backed by electronic money free.

This publication describes a voluntary risk management framework ("the Framework") that consists of standards, guidelines, and best practices to manage cybersecurity-related risk. The Framework's prioritized, flexible, and cost-effective approach helps to promote the protection and resilience of critical infrastructure and other sectors important to the economy and national security.