The Gambia’s Social Security and Housing Finance Corporation launched an enrolment campaign for informal workers on October 22, with 1,800 people already registered in the Taye Sama scheme, Managing Director Saloum Malang said at an event in Lamin.
The programme opens social security to workers previously excluded from schemes focused on formal employment, including farmers, market traders, fishers, drivers and artisans. Its pilot phase gives priority to women working in horticulture and small-scale trade.
SSHFC estimates from a nationwide mapping exercise that 85% of Gambian workers have no social security coverage. The scheme is intended to protect them against risks linked to old age, illness and income shocks in an economy where self-employment and informal activity account for most jobs.
The campaign brings to implementation a project begun in 2023. The institution designed the scheme and its digital platform with its own staff. The system supports offline registration, mobile-money contributions and member access to balances and benefits, according to reports published before the launch by The Standard and Voice Gambia.
SSHFC plans to expand registration across the country. Malang said the programme should move The Gambia closer to universal social protection by 2030, but the institution has not yet published a detailed timetable or a national enrolment target.