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Cash and Voucher Assistance (CVA) is globally recognized as a valuable tool that provides flexible and effective support to people affected by crises. Where markets are functioning and safely accessible, CVA can deliver humanitarian assistance in a dignified manner, empowering individuals to make their own choices when covering their humanitarian needs instead of being just passive recipients of aid. CVA also supports the recovery of fragile markets and strengthens local economies, creating a multiplication effect in target communities and building resilience.
CVA can be delivered quickly and cost-effectively, making it a crucial element of humanitarian responses.
In Nigeria, CVA programming has been on a steady rise since 2013. The use of CVA has grown from 6 percent of the total Humanitarian Response Plan (HRP) related funding in 2016 to 40 percent in the 2023 HRP. In 2019, key donors developed the Common Donor Approach (CDA) to enhance cohesion across the use of CVA to meet humanitarian needs in Nigeria. As part of the Interagency Standing Committee Cash Coordination Model, the Federal Government, represented by the former Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development (now Federal Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Reduction), had assumed the role of Cash Working Group co-chair, clearly signalling the commitment of the Government of Nigeria to the CVA modality.
Despite the successes of CVA programmes and their massive scaling over the years, challenges remain. One of the major obstacles to further expansion of humanitarian CVA is the lack of financial inclusion, which limits the reach of CVA programmes to the most vulnerable populations. Limited financial infrastructure, especially in remote areas, lack of formal identification and low financial literacy hinder further scaling of CVA across the response.
Concurrently, while great efforts have been made among humanitarian actors to align and harmonize the CVA response across the country, there is space for further consolidation of the CVA in Nigeria, with the potential for increased value for money across the response.
In this context, the administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu recognizes the need for a national policy that supports the use of CVA in the humanitarian response and that provides linkages for CVA initiatives with the government framework on social protection that promotes inclusive growth, equality, security and ensures a life of dignity. The Government has also taken steps to integrate CVA into its broader humanitarian and development policies, recognizing the potential of CVA to build resilience and contribute to the humanitarian development peace nexus.
The present National Policy on Cash and Voucher Assistance in Humanitarian Context in Nigeria provides a framework for the delivery of CVA to persons affected by crises in a coordinated, efficient, and transparent manner. Beyond this, humanitarian CVA can establish the building blocks to link to social safety nets thereby providing a pathway for sustainable poverty reduction.
The policy aims to leverage humanitarian CVA to deliver on key national policy domains while ensuring the protection and empowerment of persons of concern (PoCs). Concurrently, enhanced linkages between humanitarian CVA and national social protection and wider developmental efforts will create synergies and