Armenia Social Transition Program

To implement this $26 million program to reform social assistance, social insurance and primary healthcare systems in Armenia being completed in 2005, PADCO managed 5 Armenian and 5 U.S. subcontractors over 5 years.  USAID's Armenia Social Transition Program (ASTP) achieved its goals: to meet the immediate social assistance needs of the most vulnerable, while establishing the foundation for sustainable and effective social insurance and primary healthcare (PHC) systems.

In partnership with counterparts including the Ministry of Labor and Social Issues, the Ministry of Health, the National Statistics Service, Yerevan State University, the medical universities and polyclinics, PADCO analyzed the legal, IT, institutional, planning and public education requirements of new approaches to social benefits and primary care. In addition, ASTP has provided guidance on reforms in the area of disability, care of children in orphanages, and care of the elderly.

Major Results

• Personal code number system to facilitate citizens' access to benefits and to increase transparency and professionalism of the social benefits system;
• Systems for MLSI to audit welfare programs in 55 local offices, to institutionalize staff training, and to set up appeals processes; 
• Integrated Social Service Centers providing one-stop services for pensions, disability benefits and poverty benefits;
• System of Personified Reporting - linked with the social security card, which will ensure that employers will make their social insurance returns based on the names and social security card numbers of employees.
• Official recognition of the profession of actuary and the education to support it;
• Pension reform law equalizing pension ages, eliminating privileged pensions for certain sectors and linking pension size to social insurance contributions;
• Social partnerships between Government and NGOs for specific service provision;
• PHC policies, standards and pilot programs in both rural Armenia and Yerevan.