Last June, at Karama Sector in Huye District, I attended an outreach campaign on social protection programmes where the Urunana DC team was performing its popular theatre plays live.

As always, high turnout is guaranteed when popular names such as Bushombe, Kankwanzi, Nyiramaliza and Gitefano are present. Most people in Karama had known these individuals through their radio sets and seeing them live was exciting.

While the Urunana team was performing, I stood at the back of the audience. One woman carrying a visibly malnourished child on her back caught my attention. Her appearance and the child were a clear indication that things were not well at home.

I approached her to understand the situation, and we had a long conversation about the challenges the family was facing. The child was her grandson, who is mentally disabled and malnourished. His mother is a single parent; she had gone to work to provide for the household. The household has six members, with four children and two adults.

What struck me from our discussion was that the grandmother did not blame the Government for lack of support. Their household already benefited from the VUP, through ‘Public works and Direct’ support and their health insurance Mutuelle de Santé, was also paid by the Government.

However, from this discussion, two things stood out.

First, social protection programmes remain essential for Rwanda to build a resilient society and achieve her ambition of becoming a middle-income country by 2035 and a high-income country by 2050.

Second, there is a need to rethink how these programmes are delivered so that support does not only help people survive but should facilitate households to sustainably graduate out of poverty.

For years, Rwanda has used a series of approaches to support and empower vulnerable households. Poor families have received cows through Girinka, others employed on Public Works received direct support while vulnerable pregnant and lactating mothers and children benefited from Nutrition Sensitive Direct support among others. These interventions have played a fundamental role in reducing poverty from 39.8 per cent in 2017 to 27.4 per cent in 2024.

That said, the Government of Rwanda and partners are now galvanising resources on: How can social protection become a real pathway out of poverty rather than a programme where some beneficiaries remain dependent on support for many years?

This is where the Rethinking Social Protection agenda becomes important.

To walk the talk, vulnerable and poor persons need to be facilitated to have permanent and decent jobs through skills development, accommodation and creation of favorable working conditions like early childhood development centres (ECDs).

There is also a need to progressively adjust adequacy of transfer values. Public works jobs pay low compared to the cost of living. Majority work but cannot afford essentials of life (food, healthcare, and education).

Access to finance is also important, but money alone is not enough. Poor families with business ideas need to be prepared through coaching and mentorship, and follow-up. Many people living below the poverty line are ambitious, nonetheless, they lack opportunity, skills to actualise them.

That is why the old saying, "Don’t give me a fish, teach me how to catch it,” remains relevant even today.

The new approach should therefore build on what people already have and help them achieve more. Those who cannot work because of severe disability, old age or chronic illness should continue to receive protection.

The goal should not be to remove people from beneficiary lists, rather make sure that when they are dropped from lists, they do not have to be re-targeted. Many developed countries that we take as models today have learnt and mastered one thing in common: Building strong social protection systems that deliver. Such systems must be able to regularly identify and track people who genuinely need support, while making sure that those who are supported to work do not remain permanently under poverty.

That is the road Rwanda is taking: Protecting people when they need help, but also giving them the skills, opportunities and support required to eventually stand on their own.

The writer is a communications specialist.