In Ghana, the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP) project, which has been around since 2008, is reaching and thus benefiting more and more households across the country. The project's main goal is to reduce poverty, through both conditional and unconditional cash transfers to the people who desperately need it the most, the extreme poor. Basically, the LEAP project provides a sort of economic safety net for very poor households against extreme poverty, giving them better access to support and opportunities that can help lead them away from impoverished livelihoods towards better living conditions.
The Deputy Minister for Employment and Social Welfare in Ghana, Antwi Bosiako Sekyere, believes that cash transfers have been observed as "one of the most effective instruments through which the poor could be empowered, and serve as a springboard for poverty reduction." He also notes that the lack of cash is the largest problem for people living in extreme poverty, which makes it very difficult to buy or have access to enough food to feed families. These cash transfers help people with this very problem, by providing them with supplies of money they can use on food, or even further investments or trading. Currently, the LEAP project is optimistic that it will reach 250,000 households by 2015.
- Brock McNairy
SOURCE: allAfrica.com
