Rapid assessment of the cash transfer for the poor students program/ bantuan siswa miskin (BSM)

With the announcement of the fuel price increase in June, 2013, the Government adopted a new approachtoto assist low income families to maintain their welfare. The compensation scheme covered: (1) Direct Cash Assistance for the People Program (BLSM), consisting of Rp 150,000 in cash for four months for around 15.5 million financially disadvantaged and vulnerable households paid in two installments; (2) increased rice rations being allocated as part of the rice-for-the-poor program (RASKIN), consisting of 15 kg per household for a period of 3 months (June, July, September 2013); (3) increased the nominal value of the assistance and number of recipients of the Poor Students Assistance Program (BSM); (4) increased the nominal value of the assistance targeted for 2.4 million households who participate in the Family Hope Program (PKH) from an average of Rp 1.4 million per year to Rp 1.8 million per year.
The Cash Transfer for the Poor Students Program (BSM) policy is based upon results of assessments and monitoring carried out in 2012 by TNP2K(Tim Nasional Percepatan Penanggulangan Kemiskinan (National Team for Acceleration of Poverty Reduction)) and the World Bank. The objectives of the new scheme include: development of an effective and efficient scholarship system to benefit the poor; right-sizing of the scholarship for each level of schooling; improving fund channeling and monitoring systems; institutional development and better definition of the roles and responsibilities of local government, schools and communities in the channeling, monitoring and evaluation of implementation of the BSM Program. A main feature of the new scheme is the integration of support for poor students with the targeting and access mechanism developed by TNP2K for cash transfers utilizing the Unified Data Base which contains the names and addresses of some 96 million persons from 60 million households (source is PPLS data) and BSM Cards (Kartu BSM) and Social Protection Cards (KPS). To support this program MoEC was intended to implement a communications strategy with the roll-out of funds to overcome the incomplete take-up rate.
The new BSM policy which came into effect in July 2013 essentially doubled the amounts of previous years for this program (for example, for elementary the amount increased from Rp 360,000 to Rp. 450,000) and about doubled the number of beneficiaries -- initially for 8.7 million school-aged children, now for 16.6 million children. Two will be made per year, at beginning of a new semester. The first tranche under the new scheme was intended to be disbursed from July to September, beginning with the most accessible regions.