Family Social Card

In Kazakhstan, the absolute method of determining poverty is used to provide social support to low-income citizens. Prime Minister of the RK Askar Mamin spoke about the mechanism for determining the relevant indicators.

Social research in order to provide state assistance to the citizens of the Republic of Kazakhstan is conducted on a quarterly basis and ensures the representativeness of data at the regional level thanks to an improved methodology based on scientific approaches.

"This method is based on the amount of the subsistence minimum and is used as a criterion for providing social support, as well as in determining the amount of social benefits (targeted social assistance, pensions, allowances, housing assistance, etc.). The source for assessing poverty is a sample survey of households (12,000 households)," Askar Mamin wrote in his response to the deputy's request.

The Prime Minister noted that the equivalence scale is used in the calculation of poverty in order to take into account the effect of savings from cohabitation of several household members. The calculation of subjective poverty is made, reflecting the subjective opinion of households regarding their material well-being, as well as the calculation of relative poverty, using the criterion of 60% of the median value of the average per capita income of the population used for consumption. It also uses the meaning of multidimensional poverty, which covers those aspects of the population's life that cannot be assessed using cost indicators: health, education, living conditions, personal security, empowerment, etc.

Multidimensional poverty indicators are calculated on the basis of microdata from household surveys.

"At the same time, an electronic family social card on the Social Assistance platform will be used to automatically determine the level of family well-being from 2019. Today, it has created digital social maps of families and covers 18.4 million people (100% of the population) across the country. On the basis of the generated social maps, the Social Assistance IC has the ability to automatically monitor the level of each family's difficult life situation. The system collects and analyzes the family automatically according to 19 parameters (economic conditions, health status, access to educational institutions, housing conditions, social factors of well-being, etc.) and outputs 5 levels of the state of its well - being/distress (crisis, emergency, dysfunctional, satisfactory and prosperous)," Mamin concluded.

Earlier, the deputies of the Parliament of the Republic of Kazakhstan raised the issue of maternity capital and assistance to families with children, a proposal was put forward to pay KZT 4.2 mln for the birth of a child.
 
For reference: In January–December 2020, non-sequestered (that is, not subject to reduction) programs of the republican budget were implemented in the amount of KZT 4.2 trln — 6.4% more than a year earlier. In particular, one-time state benefits in connection with the birth of a child amounted to KZT 52.3 bln, benefits for caring for a child under one year — KZT 31.7 bln, benefits for parents and guardians raising disabled children-KZT 49.6 bln, benefits for mothers with many children — KZT49.1 bln.

Over the past year, 425.6 thousand people were born in the country — 5.6% more than a year earlier.