SOUTHMOD work presented at the Mozambique Social Protection Week

The Ministry of Gender, Child and Social Action (MGCAS) organises a Social Protection theme week in Mozambique 11-15 October 2021. During the week, on 15 October, The Mozambican Ministry of Economy and Finance (MEF) with Internation Labour Organization (ILO) Mozambique is organising a seminar to introduce the findings of recent Policy Briefs compiled with the help of MOZMOD tax-benefit microsimulation model. UNU-WIDER Research Associate Rodrigo Oliveira will join the event.

Oliveira will attend the event to share the results of a recent study on the impact of COVID-19 in sub-Saharan Africa, focusing on Mozambique. The other three Policy Briefs will be presented by the national MOZMOD team. Themes of the Policy Briefs are Old Age Pension, Child Benefit and Basic Social Subsidy Program (BSSP). The simulations done with the MOZMOD model allow to analyze the costs and benefits of the social protection programmes.

This policy event is attended by researchers, government officials and development specialists.

The social protection Policy Briefs were initiated by the participants of a 6-day capacity development retreat held in June in Macaneta, Mozambique. The MOZMOD retreat was organized by MEF, ILO, Southern African Social Policy Research Insights (SASPRI) and UNU-WIDER. The retreat allowed participants to get acquainted with the MOZMOD tax-benefit model and to produce policy briefs based on the model. The briefs serve to answer the questions that are most relevant to the work of the participants, and to the Mozambican society.

The participants included government officials in stakeholder institutions such as the National Institute of Social Security (INSS), Ministry of Gender, Child and Social Action (MGCAS), National Institute for Social Action (INAS), National Institute of Statistics (INE), and Ministry of Labor.

About MOZMOD

Tax-benefit microsimulation models — which combine representative household-level data on incomes and expenditures and detailed coding of tax and benefit legislation — have proven to be an extremely useful tool for policy makers and researchers. The models apply user-defined tax and benefit policy rules to microdata on individuals and households and calculate the effects of these rules on household income. The effects of different policy scenarios on poverty, inequality, and government revenues can be analysed and compared.

Since its initial inception in 2015, UNU-WIDER has been developing and maintaining with MEF a tax-benefit microsimulation model for Mozambique (MOZMOD), supported by SASPRI. ILO Mozambique serves as a local partner in delivering capacity-building activities. UNU-WIDER's Inclusive Growth in Mozambique team collaborates with the SOUTHMOD team and supports organizing different activities in Mozambique.

This event is part of the SOUTHMOD - simulating tax and benefit policies for development  project. SOUTHMOD project is part of UNU-WIDER's research and capacity building programme on domestic revenue mobilization (DRM), funded by the Norwegian Agency for Development Co-operation (Norad).