The UN Global Accelerator and the World Bank’s Social Protection and Jobs (SPJ) Compass both aim to forge concerted action among international partners, strengthen national ownership and apply a systems approach, to social protection, decent and productive job creation.
As a joint mechanism of the UN and World Bank, the M-GA is supporting increased collaboration and collective action, under national leadership, and with coordinated support from the UN agencies, World Bank, development banks, and existing platforms such as the Global Partnership on Universal Social Protection (USP2030), as well as other relevant partners.
The M-GA aims to achieve five development objectives:
The first call was in 2024, and nine Global Accelerator pathfinder countries were selected to implement projects with USD 500,000 funding for two years. The implementation of the projects started in Q4 2024.
Country proposals from the first funding round focused on the following themes:
- Cabo Verde: Economic inclusion, formalization of micro-businesses
- Cambodia: Evaluating social assistance and strengthening technical and vocational training
- Colombia: Integrated and resilient social protection system
- Indonesia: Social protection and employment for persons with disabilities
- Nepal: Advancing productivity and social protection for women, youth, and informal workers
- Paraguay: Social protection and labour policies for women and youth
- Philippines: Financing for decent jobs and social protection for gig and platform workers
- Uzbekistan: Social Insurance Law development and implementation
- Viet Nam: Social protection, labour policies, and skills for green transition
The second call was launched in May 2025, with a more ambitious scope, under two tracks.
Open to 18 existing pathfinder countries that made high-level commitments to expanding or strengthening social protection systems and creating decent and productive jobs for just transitions, through deepened UN-World Bank collaboration. The joint programmes aimed specifically at addressing gender gaps and barriers to ensure gender-transformative solutions are furthered through the M-GA. Countries that have not previously received M-GA funding in round 1 received USD 1,325 million while the others received USD 775,000.
Albania and Malawi, who were unsuccessful in the first M-GA funding round, refined their proposals based on the joint UN-World Bank technical feedback, and received USD 530,000 each.
Funded countries: Albania, Bhutan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Guinea, Malawi, Namibia, Nepal, Paraguay, Rwanda, Senegal and Uzbekistan.
This track was opened to a wider group of 51 pre-selected countries, that have demonstrated clear value-added benefit from the UN-World Bank collaboration. The proposals aimed to foster increased collaboration and collective action in the contexts of fragility, green transition and climate change and the informal economy. Successful joint proposals received USD 910,000. The Thematic Track also tested innovation by inviting multi-country proposals, with three proposals being submitted, by the Caribbean, Francophone Africa, and Latin America, of which the Latin America one was successful.
- Fragility: Haiti, Latin America (multi-country proposal of Guatemala and Honduras), Syria, State of Palestine and Zimbabwe
- Climate Change: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Botswana, Jordan and Kenya
- Informality: Georgia, Sri Lanka and Tunisia
In this funding round, proposals were equally required to demonstrate how they would achieve either gender-responsive and gender-transformative outcomes, specifically targeting the gaps and barriers present in their countries. The funding round placed emphasis on gender integration in the proposals, with six joint programmes pursuing gender equality as a principal objective. Under the second call, 23 proposals, including one multi-country proposal have been selected to get funded for two-year joint programmes.
The map shows the countries where M-GA projects are being implemented. Click on the dots for more information.
Labour market programmes and activation measures are essential to promoting decent jobs and universal social protection, particularly in developing countries where unemployment and precarious work prevail. Active labour market programmes (ALMPs), combined with social protection measures, feature prominently in Global Accelerator pathfinder country roadmaps and M-GA projects, helping disadvantaged groups access better opportunities.
However, global data on ALMPs primarily focuses on high-income countries. To address this, the ILO and World Bank are aligning methodologies and coordinating data collection, prioritizing Global Accelerator pathfinder and developing countries. This initiative is expanding high-quality, comparable data on ALMPs, improving policy formulation, implementation, and monitoring.
The following activities are being undertaken:
- A data collection tool has been developed by the ILO and the WB, with harmonized definitions and approaches for ALMPs, across 17 countries (Cabo Verde, Cambodia, Colombia, Malawi, Namibia, Nepal, Paraguay, the Philippines, Rwanda, Senegal, Viet Nam covered by the ILO and, Brazil, Bhutan, Ethiopia, the Republic of Congo, Tunisia, and Uzbekistan)
- Building a repository of ALMP information that strengthens evidence-based decision-making, programme design and implementation, and supports cross-country comparability
- A joint report presenting key findings is currently being drafted
As countries work to reduce GHG emissions, protecting poor and vulnerable populations from climate change impacts is critical. Social protection systems are recognized as key to climate adaptation and disaster response but are less explored in enabling households to adapt their livelihoods, resource use, and service access to mitigate risks.
The World Bank and UNICEF are working together to (i) enhance social protection systems to help vulnerable households reduce climate risk exposure, including slow-onset events, and (ii) build an investment case for social protection as a climate action policy using relevant metrics.
Key outcomes include:
- Supporting adaptation: Identify barriers to adaptation, analyse existing evidence, conduct case studies, and recommend ways to improve social protection systems.
- Social protection as climate action: Establish a rationale for investing in social protection, quantify its impact on resilience and adaptation, and present results using climate-relevant metrics.
The following activities are being undertaken:
- The inception phase of the knowledge product has been initiated, and a broad-based review of the literature has been completed, with particular attention to evidence on the role of social protection systems in climate adaptation, resilience, and loss and damage, beyond their traditional focus on shock response.
- The findings from this review are currently being synthesized to inform the development of a research framework, which will guide the evidence collection process on how social protection can support poor and vulnerable households to adapt livelihoods, adjust resource use, and improve access to services in the context of escalating climate risks, in line with the objectives outlined in the concept note.
Globally, only 52.4 per cent of the population has access to social protection, with large disparities between rural and urban areas, with a significant proportion of those not covered, relying on agriculture for their subsistence. At least 12 GA pathfinder or M-GA countries, which have included the transformation of the agrifood sector as a priority of their roadmap and/or joint programs.
FAO, ILO and the World Bank will collaborate to develop a practical guidance package, based on country experience, to support governments, social partners and other non-state actors in pathfinder countries and beyond, to design solutions for extending social protection for decent and productive jobs in the agrifood sector in rural areas.
The following activities are being undertaken:
- The inception phase of the global product is underway, with the World Bank, ILO and FAO team having begun preliminary discussions on country selection
- Two different support modalities are being considered: “in-depth”: on-site missions in up to two countries; and “light”: remote provision of technical assistance to other countries (based on demand). Bilateral discussions are being organized with pathfinder countries to better understand the challenges and opportunities they face in creating decent jobs and extending social protection to rural areas and agriculture sector, and to identify opportunities for policy/institutional support
A standard module on social protection for Labour Force Survey (LFS) and Household Income and Expenditure Survey (HIES), will be developed and piloted, as a collaboration between the ILO and the World Bank, with technical collaboration with UNICEF.
Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, Germany
International Development Programme, Ireland
