Turkmenistan’s social service providers build up their capacities to pilot new community-based social services

This training is one in the series of social service workforce capacity-building trainings organized by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) jointly with the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection of Population of Turkmenistan as part of the UN-Turkmenistan Joint Programme on introduction of inclusive and quality community-based social services.

The training focused on the social service provision principles and quality standards , social work assessment and monitoring theory, standards and methods, planning social services and active participation of beneficiaries both in planning and implementation, developing and implementing specialized social services, human resources management in social service provision, and drafting grant proposals for implementation of  specific  social services. 

According to Jemile Gurbanowa from Ashgabat social service institution for elderly people and people with disabilities under the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection of Turkmenistan, the training was very intense and useful for participants.

"Not only we learned the best international practices in social service provision but also the practice of developing quality and inclusive social services at community level using our own resources and opportunities”, she said.

“Along with learning specifics of community-based social services, we also received a lot of useful information and knowledge that we can further use in our work, such as types of assessment in social work,” Sabu Ibragimova from Ashgabat-based “Keyik Okara” said.

Kurban Bugrayev, head of the Mary-based “Mashgala” noted that he was able to upgrade his knowledge in human resource management and resource mobilization in social service provision. He was also excited about upcoming pilots of new social services as part of the Joint Programme that will also open up opportunities for social contracting in provision of social services.  

The UN Joint Programme “Improving the system of social protection through the introduction of inclusive quality community-based social services”, funded by the Joint SDG Fund, is being implemented by the partnering UN agencies, namely, UNICEF, UNDP, UNFPA, and UNODC and Government of Turkmenistan. The Joint Programme is aimed at introducing a new model of social services at the community level accompanied by relative legislative reviews and capacity building of national social service workforce. The lead national partner is the Ministry of Labor and Social Protection of the Population of Turkmenistan and the lead UN agency is UNICEF. Other key national partners include the Ministry of Education, Ministry of Health and Medical Industry, and Ministry of Finance and Economy.

Implementation period: 2020-2022.