The little town of Loeriesfontein in Namaqualand, part of the western Karoo, is desperately poor and even before the Covid-19 pandemic, social grants made up close to half the town's household income. The Covid-19 'social relief of distress' grant has made a major difference in Loeriesfontein.
The devastating impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and associated lockdown on household incomes in South Africa has been widely reported. So too have concerns about the effectiveness of the state's cross-sectoral response, along with debates on the importance of its temporary adjustments to the grant payments administered by the South African Social Security Agency (Sassa).
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