The Malawi Social Registry, also popularly known as the Unified Beneficiary Registry, has attracted commendation from the World Bank for making impressive strides in registering households for consideration under different programs that government is reaching out to its people through targeting.

The remarks were made in Lilongwe during the recent technical support mission by the bank to the Social Support for Resilient Livelihoods Project (SSRLP) where the UBR gets part of its funding for rolling out

‘It is pleasing to note that the Malawi Social Registry continues to gain prominence through striving to broaden user programs and increasing coverage across districts in terms of registered households’, said Task Team Leader for the SSRLP Chipo Msowoya.

‘More programs are gearing towards using the social registry as a source of information for targeting.  The team should now look forward beyond registration where issues of dynamic updates and institutionalization at national and local level are fully prioritized and explored’, he said.

In an interview with the Ministry of Finance and Economic Affairs, Chief Economist Bessie Msusa agreed with the World Bank that the UBR in Malawi could be proud of the strides it has made so far  in registering over two and a half million people in 15 districts and more districts being targeted with data at 100% registration of households, making Malawi’s UBR at probably 65% in households registered which is  the second in Africa which is slightly higher.

The Social Registry continues to be rolled out in the country through registration of households to enable a broader User program for data.

In his remarks, SSRLP coordinator Paul Chipeta said the UBR management unit would quickly address several salient issues within the next few months, such as undertaking and reviewing its security and risk protocols as well as positioning itself to put in place mechanisms for dynamic updates to ensure updated household information which is very crucial to ensure effective targeting of households for different programs.

The SSRLP high level technical support mission by the World Bank has since wound up.