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Oliver Kazunga, Senior Business Reporter
A VOLUNTARY informal sector social protection scheme under the National Social Security Authority (NSSA) is set to be operational in the first quarter of next year.

Zimbabwe’s economy is undergoing structural transformation, which has seen more people being employed in the small to medium enterprise sector as registered and non-registered players.

According to NSSA deputy director for social security, Mrs Tambudzai Jongwe, the authority has of late recorded 1,8 million inactive contributors and 1,4 million active contributors out of a total of 3,2 million registered members.

She told journalists during the second session of the 2021 virtual media mentorship programme that this was due to company closures and retrenchments.

In this context, Mrs Jongwe said NSSA has seen opportunities to extend social security coverage both in terms of verticalcoverage (the number of contingencies covered) as well as horizontal coverage (numbers of people covered) tapping into  the informal sector, which presently is excluded.

“As an authority we have actually seen the compelling need to extend coverage to  the informal sector and we are working  with ILO (International LabourOrganisation) closely for technical guidance,” she said.

“We are hoping that by 2022 first quarter, we’ll have our fully fledged voluntary sector scheme running.”
So far, out of the nine NSSA branches of coverage, the authority is presently catering for four contingencies namely — old age benefit, invalidity benefit, survivor benefit and the employment injury.

The other five, which are health care, sickness, unemployment, family benefit and maternity benefit are yet to be introduced in the country.

“But our wish is to ensure that we extend to the five remaining contingencies so that we have a more comprehensive social protection initiative in Zimbabwe.

“We are taking this issue seriously because we are covering only 24 percent of the working populace as the informal sector is ballooning,” said Mrs Jongwe.

About 76 percent of the working population is said to be operating in the informal sector yet the sector remains uncovered by any form of social  protection.

Mrs Jongwe said the contributions  base from employees was shrinking due to    the adverse impact of the Covid-19  pandemic.

“NSSA is employment-based but as more and more people are retrenched or their income is suppressed because they are not working full throttle, it means there are job losses and it reduces contributions,” she said.

Mrs Jongwe said the pandemic had also seen an increase in the number of pensions or claims that are lodged with NSSA.

“As a result of the pandemic, administration costs incurred by NSSA increased as the authority implemented strategies to ensure people continued to receive their pensions in the midst of Covid-19,” she said. — @okazunga