TNAG-0531-FCO40-626-Application-of-International-Labour-Convention-to-Hong-Kong-1975 — Page 184

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(vi)

(vii)

(viii)

The such as:

the data base for effective social security planning is weak; meaningful social security indicators remain to be developed;

unlike health, education and social welfare which cover the entire population, social security, at its present stage of development, covers but a smaller portion of the population. Among the sectoral programmes, its inter-se priority is, therefore, lower;

social security programmes, though familiar to those who directly handle social security, often remain unfamiliar to development planners. The tools of planning for social security are yet to be developed.

enumeration of

these problems is bound to provoke a series of questions Are all the sectoral programmes included in the development plans amenable to the techniques of allocative planning? If the techniques of targetry and programming in the certain economic sectors and many social sectors suffer from the same weakness attributed to the social security, why wait for perfection of tools and techniques for social security planning? Are there no conceivable means to promote the understanding of social security by development planners at the national and local levels? The debate could be unending but what is probably relevant is to reach out for all feasible methods designed to render the social security sector more "planable".

Some suggestions

8. At the national level, what are the ways in which the development planners could be helped and prompted to take more interest in social security in order that the sector might be brought more prominently within the periphery of their planning exercises? A number of approaches are possible:

(i) at the national level, an attempt should be made to define

the objectives within the social security sector;

(ii)

(iii)

(iv)

(v)

(vi)

and clarify

it will be helpful to attempt a more effective integration of social and economic information systems at the national level so that both social and economic data can be gathered and identified with regard to the same individuals, families, groups or regions. In this connection, it might be useful to include social security as a component of the family budget surveys and other socio-economic surveys covering housenold economies;

the planning structures responsible for social sectors, including social security, within the central planning bodies are far from developed in most developing countries of Asia. This phenomenon has been confirmed by surveys carried out by the ECAFE. The deficiency should be made good by building up the professional competence of social planning units within the planning bodies responsible for social security planning;

the character and frequency of the dialogue between social security institutions and planning bodies could be improved. Although both parties should come half-way to achieve this objective, the initiative should increasingly come from the social security institutions to get themselves equipped to carry out the necessary dialogue with the development planners. In concrete form, this would amount to building up effective and viable planning cells within the social security institutions or departments responsible for development

of social security;

the technical bodies and structures established at the national level by the planning bodies to elaborate the planning aspects of social security should have the necessary status and continuity to have an impact on national policies;

the flexibility of the social security programmes to absorb innovative methods should merit attention. The social security institutions should be able to readapt the programmes keeping in line with the changing social needs. In effecting such readaptations, there is every advantage to rely on the opinions of beneficiaries and potential beneficiaries through well structured opinion surveys. Experts' opinions on what is good for the participants in a social security scheme might not alone suffice;

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