Suriname to Improve Social Protection System with IDB Support

The Board of Directors of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) approved a US$40 million project to expand the capacity of Suriname's social protection system to strengthen human capital among vulnerable households.  

The project will improve Suriname's social protection system and efficiency to better safeguard vulnerable populations, with a special focus on female-led poor households, persons with disabilities, and households in poverty with children. 

The operation will finance existing cash transfers provided to impoverished households and people with disabilities. The project will also finance the expansion of Suriname's safety net by enrolling an additional 5,000 beneficiaries of the Financial Support to Poor Households and the Financial Support to Persons with Disabilities programs. The cash transfer programs will be complemented with a family support program to facilitate access to education, health, and other social services among vulnerable households. 

The project will bolster the expansion with quality of Suriname's early childhood development (ECD) services through the design and implementation of a home-visiting ECD program among 2,000 vulnerable children under four years old, including the development of learning materials as well as training of community facilitators and supervisors.  Evidence demonstrates that high-quality ECD programs for disadvantaged children can mitigate the effects of poverty on child development and improve children's long-term educational outcomes, productivity, and income. 

The project will benefit more than 20,000 persons with disabilities and their families, more than 16,000 households who receive family support, and 2,000 children under four years old and their families who receive the family-based ECD program. 

The US$40 million IDB loan has a disbursement period of 5 years and a grace period of 5.5 years.