Gender Aware Beneficiary Assessment of St. Vincent and the Grenadines' Public Assistance Programme

The Build Back Equal Project, funded by Global Affairs Canada and led by UN Women Multi-Country Office – Caribbean with UNFPA Caribbean, works to reduce barriers to women's economic empowerment in Dominica, Grenada, Saint Lucia and St. Vincent and the Grenadines. As part of this project, UN Women commissioned a Gender Aware Beneficiary Assessment (GABA) — authored by Dr. Kimberly-Ann Gittens-Baynes and edited by Dr. Robin Haarr — applying the same diagnostic tool across all four countries and publishing the St. Vincent and the Grenadines findings in December 2025.

The assessment's findings on St. Vincent and the Grenadines' Public Assistance Programme (PAP), managed by the Ministry of National Mobilization, were largely critical: the programme runs on a paper-based information system using basic tools such as Google Sheets; it is structured as an individual- rather than household-based benefit, meaning women in a household are not directly supported unless they are themselves a child, elderly, disabled or chronically ill applicant; its benefit design contains no gender analysis; and its application process is centralised in Kingstown, disproportionately burdening women with childcare or mobility constraints. The report explicitly documents these as gaps rather than achievements, in line with an honest evidence standard.

The GABA process produced 10 concrete recommendations for St. Vincent and the Grenadines: reform the outdated Public Assistance Act with gender-responsive provisions; develop cohesive social-protection and gender policies; write a comprehensive PAP operations manual; implement the planned Social Assistance Management Information System (SAMIS) with gender-sensitive data collection; build staff capacity; establish an internal information-sharing strategy; expand the benefit structure to include psychosocial support and childcare; embed the Gender Affairs Division into the PAP operational team; run public information campaigns; and subsidise childcare for vulnerable households.

As of the report's December 2025 publication, these recommendations had not yet been implemented, and no follow-up evaluation of outcomes exists. The value of this practice lies in its transparent, replicated (four-country) diagnostic methodology rather than in demonstrated programme impact — a cautionary but well-evidenced case of what a rigorous gender assessment can reveal about an under-resourced national safety net.

Read the full analysis: https://www.gov.vc/index.php/media-center/1627-public-assistance-update