Using Disaster Risk Financing to Build Adaptive Social Protection for Climate Shocks in Malawi

The Government of Malawi put in place a mechanism that enables its flagship unconditional cash transfer program-the Social Cash Transfer Program (SCTP)—to scale up response to additional beneficiaries when shocks occur. Making the SCTP shock-responsive is a key strategic pillar of the government’s Disaster Risk Financing Strategy. The SCTP scalable mechanism was first implemented during the 2021/22 rainfall season in three initially selected districts (Blantyre, Ntcheu, and Thyolo). It covered 74,000 poor and vulnerable households that would be eligible to receive a cash transfer in the event of a shock, and in fact a drought and compounding shocks resulted in a payout for the households. In 2022/23, the mechanism was expanded to cover over 100,000 households in six districts; the long-term goal is to make it a nationwide mechanism. This note summarizes the gpvernment’s process for establishing this mechanism and presents key results and lessons learned