labor watch - A labor report stressed that social protection structure in Jordan needs fundamental reforms to ensure coverage of all beneficiaries as one of the human rights.
The report titled “Social Protection in Jordan 2014” issued by Labor-Watch Jordan program, an affiliate of Phenix Center for Economics and Informatics Studies in cooperation with the Friedrich Ebert Foundation of Germany revealed that the social protection system suffered from a number of difficulties including multiplicity of parties overseeing its activities which characterized it with dispersion and weakness.
The report added that Jordanian legislations covered large part of social protection elements within a legal frame which included a wide range of laws, regulations, and directives. However, most relevant national legislations still suffer from inadequacy and incompatibility with international standards.
With regard to social security legislations, the report revealed that Jordan has ratified only one of ILO conventions related to social security namely Convention No. 102 for 1952 on Minimum Standards of Social Protection. However, Jordan has not ratified any of Conventions No. 121 for 1964 on Employment Injury Benefits, No. 128 for 1967 on Old Age and Survivors Benefits, No. 130 for 1969 on Medical Care and Sickness Benefits, and No. 183 for 2000 on Maternity Protection.
The report divided the prim drivers behind social protection into two parts: governmental drivers, and non-governmental drivers. The governmental drivers comprised the Social Security Corporation, Civil Pension Fund, and Military Pension System, in addition to some institutions and campaigns aimed at empowering marginalized groups in the society to face difficulties of living conditions, including The Hashemite Jordanian Commission, The Charity Campaign, Tkiyt Um Ali etc. The non-governmental parties were represented in various civil society organizations which provide different forms of social assistance for the poor and vulnerable groups.
The report emphasized that national floors for social protection ought to include at least basic healthcare including maternity care to be easily accessible and of high quality, provision of basic income for children, provision of nutrition, education and healthcare, and provision of basic income not less than the minimum wage rate for persons who are of working age and are unable to find a job particularly in cases of sickness, unemployment, maternity, disability, and the elderly.
As regards the compatibility of the social protection system in Jordan in light of social protection standards stipulated in ILO recommendation 202 for 2012 on National Floors for Social Protection the report said that it was weak, did not cover all citizens, did not provide full coverage, did not cover special needs of all vulnerable social groups, unable to integrate workers in the informal sector in the social security system, and incompetent in terms of its weak funding and its vital dependency on contributions of beneficiaries only.
Social Security:
The report pointed out that the Social Security Corporation was the largest social protection network in terms of numbers of beneficiaries and the type of protection it offers. However, like other social security systems throughout the world it depended on contributions of workers and both employers of the public and private sectors.
The report added that the Social Security Corporation covered about 66% of workers in the Kingdom, as according to figures of the Social Security Corporation a number of one million and seventy thousands workers were registered; proportion of registered women was estimated at 258 thousands representing 25% of registered workers. The report noted, however, that these figures were questionable, as figures of the Ministry of Planning talked about a percentage of 44% of workers in Jordan who were employed in the informal sector and did not benefit from any kind of social protection.
Moreover, the report emphasized that the social security system was one of the coherent social protection systems except it suffered from weak inclusiveness and short coverage of all types of social protection such as healthcare and health protection.
Educational protection:
The report illustrated that despite improvement achieved in the field of education as schools were opened throughout the Kingdom, as well as the considerable improvement in reducing illiteracy to reach 6.7% in 2012, but it continued to face the persisting problem of school dropouts which reached a percentage of 0.31% in the school year 2011/2012; it also suffered from the continued operation of two-shift school system due to shortage of public schools, especially in heavily populated areas.
Furthermore, outputs of the Jordanian educational system were of a too low quality according to statements of education officials such as Minister of Higher Education and Minster of Education who confessed lately that nearly 20% of students in elementary classes did not master reading, writing, and simple calculations.
Healthcare Security
The report clarified that health protection was not comprehensive enough; those covered by health insurance system were only civil servants and their families, citizens below six years and over sixty years of age, as well as heart, cancer, and kidney patients. Accordingly, the health protection system suffered from not covering all citizens, as well as weak quality of health services due to poor financial allocations, widespread bureaucracy in concerned departments and institutions, in addition to weak control and evaluation.
Ahmed Awad, Director of the Phenix Center for Economics and Informatics Studies stated that various social protection programs were negatively affected due to implementation of many restructuring programs, and the retreat in Jordan’s spending on education, health, and labor (employment).
In conclusion, the report recommended reconsidering the existing developmental model and the consequent economic policies to be based on the bill of human rights including social protection, as well as directing all policies toward realization of these rights, ratification by the Government on ILO conventions related to social security, and the integration thereof in relevant legislations and policies. It also recommended the consolidation of standards of national floors for social protection as stipulated in ILO recommendation 202 for 2012 in relevant local legislations.
According to Awad, the report demanded activation of the Social Security Law in terms of wider coverage of all workers, and not to allow employers to escape from registering their workers in the social security system in evasion from their financial obligations; in addition to a recommendation to increase public spending on health and education services in the general budget in order to improve the quality of health and education services.