Jordan Social Protection

I led the Jordan portfolio as both project manager and main researcher, responsible for ensuring delivery, working with the team leader on quality assurance, and stakeholder engagement. My work focused on assessing and strengthening the country’s social protection system by grounding policy decisions in expenditure analysis, functional classification, and Public Financial Management (PFM) frameworks.

My responsibilities included:

• Conducting program-level reviews and in-depth spending analysis

• Coordinating with national partners and internal teams, while managing project budgets and timelines

• Co-leading the validation meetings and being part of a team to deliver capacity building training for the government counterparts

• Leading presentations and technical discussions with high-level decision-makers and development partners

In partnership with institutions such as the Ministry of Social Development (MoSD), the General Budget Department (GBD), and UNICEF, our work aimed to:

• Assess historical trends in social protection spending across lifecycle risks and population groups

• Support the functional classification of over 70 programs across 21 institutions, using COFOG and ESSPROS frameworks

• Align program budgets with policy objectives under Jordan’s National Social Protection Strategy (NSPS)

• Strengthen institutional understanding of the budget cycle, focusing on how program design is translated into budget tagging, classification, and execution

• Bridge gaps between on-budget and off-budget (donor-funded) social protection programs

Udpates: In May 2025
Wrapped up two back-to-back missions to Jordan - both deeply engaging in different ways.
The missions coincided with the launch of Jordan’s new National Social Protection Strategy (2025–2033). For more information, please find the press release for the strategy here.

The first mission focused on functional classification validation. We worked closely with national partners to validate the landscape of social protection programs across ministries and agencies. Over 21 three-way meetings were held between the GBD, line ministries, and our team (UNICEF and consultants).

Our goal: to validate COFOG functional classifications across various programs - a task that demanded both technical rigour and strong stakeholder engagement. It was especially insightful to see how Jordan’s shift to results-based budgeting is driving demand for more meaningful classifications — disaggregated by program type and population group (children, older persons, survivors, etc.).

The second mission focused on capacity building - a chance to return, present our findings, and co-develop tools to help line ministries apply these classifications directly into their budgets.

Both missions reinforced a lesson I carry across all my work in the region: policy reform is only as strong as the ownership it builds.

Grateful to local partners and the incredible team that made this work possible: Fidelis, Michaela, Aws, Ellie, Yacine, and Dennis.