Resourcing social protection policy for the economic empowerment of the elderly; case study: Koboko district

Abstract

This study discusses the resourcing component of the social protection for the economic empowerment of the elderly in Koboko district. The research focused on investigating three fundamental questions of understanding the sources of funding for social protection, the factors that determine its accessibility and provision to the elderly and the possible strategies to promote the provision of social protection services to the elderly. The study employed multiple designs and approaches to investigate the quest for knowledge in this area and thus the study was primarily rooted in interpretive phenomenology as the main overriding design. Meanwhile, case study design and narrative design were used as a supplementary design to interrogate the social protection needs of the elderly. Above all, the study anchored these designs on the transformative paradigm to change the statuesque of the participants, in this case, the elderly. Data were collected using in-depth interviews, focus group discussion and observation. This data was organized and analyzed using ATLAS. ti based on the thematic, narrative and content analysis that suits the selected designs of this study. The findings of the study reveal that SAGE, pension and Gratuity, NSSF and other mainstream programs like the NAADS, NUSAF3, and PRDP 3 were the main sources of funding for the elderly in the district. The study found out issues of poor health, limited funding, and housing as some of the issues affecting the policy implementation. As a result, the study recommends rigorous financial strategies by the government, undertaking reforms and reviews on the policy guidelines like the age factor, decentralizing the policy implementation and evaluation to the local government, improving housing and infrastructure development of the elderly and pursuing public-private sector arrangement and as well as strengthening multi-sectoral mechanisms with the relevant government Ministries, Departments and Agencies.