Aswesuma — Sri Lanka's Algorithmic Welfare-Targeting Score, and Its Exclusion Problem

Aswesuma launched in 2023 as the IMF-linked successor to the decades-old Samurdhi programme, replacing manual and politically discretionary welfare targeting with a formula-based score.
Sri Lanka's Department of Census and Statistics computes a Multi-dimensional Deprivation Score from 22 indicators covering education, health, housing, assets, demographics and economic status, gathered through a household survey using Proxy Means Test methodology, and sorts households into one of four benefit tiers.
Coverage rose from 18.8% of the population under Samurdhi in 2016 to 29.1% under Aswesuma per the 2024-25 BRIGHT survey, still short of the government's 35% target. Groundviews' analysis of the scoring data found that 12.34 million people — 55.7% of the population — were assessed as multi-dimensionally vulnerable, yet only around 2 million households were actually selected as beneficiaries.
Human Rights Watch documented what it called 'chaotic' reform outcomes, with arbitrary cutoffs and high exclusion of eligible households; Groundviews titled its investigation 'Aswesuma: High Exclusion, Low Transparency?'; and the policy institute LIRNEasia has called for clearer public explanation of how the algorithm operates. Reporting notes that public blame for selection errors has often been directed at 'the computer software' rather than at policy design.

Read the full analysis: https://groundviews.org/2023/12/04/aswesuma-high-exclusion-low-transparency/