WFP warns over critical food situation
28/08/2012 00:00:00
by Staff Reporter
IRREGULAR rains, poor agricultural practices and ongoing economic challenges have pushed Zimbabwe into an increasingly critical food security situation, the United Nations food relief agency warned.
According to the World Food Programme (WFP), the past several weeks have provided signs of growing distress across the African country with high food prices, empty silos and granaries, and a reduced cereal harvest, aggravating the country's food security outlook.
"Late and erratic rains, poor agricultural practices, constrained access to inputs, and a reduction in planted area have all contributed to reducing the national cereal harvest by 33 per cent this year," WFP said in a statement on its Zimbabwe Vulnerability Assessment (ZimVAC).
The organisation further noted that a lack of diversified livelihoods and the rising cost of living were combining to create a perfect storm of income and food insecurity.
WFP pointed out that over 1.6 million Zimbabweans will be in need of food assistance during the peak hunger period spanning January to March 2013.
ZimVAC is an annual study conducted by the government in collaboration with UN agencies and non-governmental organisations in order to estimate national food insecurity levels.
The UN agency has since announced it was scaling up operations in conjunction with the government and other stakeholders to provide a combination of food distribution and cash transfers to those in need.
The WFP further said it would require approximately $119 million to complete its operations in the country until the end of March 2013, though it said that almost three-quarters of the funding has not yet been accounted for.
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Malawi farmer’s organization wins WFP P4P initiative for the first time
By Nyasa Times
Published: July 8, 2010
For the first time ever in Malawi a farmers’ organization, made up of over 95,000 smallholder farmers, has won a competitive bid this week for the World Food Programme (WFP).
According to WFP statement, this purchase of 50 metric tons of maize was part of WFP’s Purchase for Progress (P4P) initiative, an innovative project that uses WFP’s purchasing power to connect smallholder farmers to agricultural markets, helping them to successfully compete for bids and improve the lives of their families and communities.
P4P has now been launched as a pilot in 21 countries – including Malawi – and this historic purchase was made from the Grain and Legumes Association through an emerging commodity exchange – the Agricultural Commodity Exchange for Africa (ACE) – located in Lilongwe.
“WFP is working with the ACE to help them to sell their surplus by attracting more traders, leading to a more competitive and transparent market. WFP has already bought over 3,100 metric tons of food commodities through ACE.
“As well as supporting the commodity exchange, P4P is also buying directly from farmers’ organizations and helping them meet market standards. In one of these transactions, WFP purchased almost 41metric tons of maize purchased from the Chikwatula Farmers’ Organization. The maize was used in WFP’s school meals programme,” reads part of the statement
With their profits, the organizations have been able to buy pallets to improve storage conditions and prevent spoiling and have invested part of their earnings in seeds and fertilizers for the next harvest.
Overall, WFP in Malawi has bought a total of 3,145 mt of commodities through P4P, including maize, maize meal, corn-soya blend and pulses.
WFP has been buying food in developing countries for many years. Now it is taking that one step further with P4P, a pilot programme in 21 countries funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Howard G. Buffett Foundation, European Commission, Governments of Belgium, Canada, Ireland, Luxembourg, United States of America and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Launched in September 2008, P4P links WFP’s demand for staple commodities with the expertise of a host of partners who support farmers to produce food surpluses and sell them at a fair price. By 2013, at least half a million smallholder farmers – mostly women – will have increased and improved their agricultural production and
earnings.
By raising farmers’ incomes, P4P turns WFP’s local procurement into a vital tool to address hunger.
Labels: MALAWI, PURCHASE FOR PROGRESS (WFP), WFP
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Gap between the rich, poor saddens WFP
By Abigail Chaponda in Ndola
Fri 12 Mar. 2010, 07:00 CAT
WORLD Food Programme (WFP) country director Pablo Recalde has observed that there is a lot of poverty in Zambia because of the unevenly distribution of wealth between the poor and the rich.
In an interview after the launch of the WFP food voucher programme in Ndola at Mukuba Hotel yesterday, Recalde said WFP hoped to turn the poor in Zambia into an investment power to lead the charge towards long term sustainable growth.
“There is a lot of poverty in Zambia because of a combination of factors. Zambia has got poverty mainly because the poor cannot access wealth. There is a big margin between the poor and the rich, we have very poor people and very rich people. In short there is unevenly distribution of wealth,” Recalde said.
“On top of that, there is no diversification. Zambia depends more on copper that does not produce a lot of employment. Agriculture is important in a country and if there is diversification, poverty levels in the country can reduce. Zambia has got land that can be used for agriculture so that there is food security in the country.”
He said there was need to break the cycle of poverty in Zambia by concentrating on agricultural activities.
Recalde said Zambia’s economy improved last year because a lot of attention was put on agriculture.
“WFP has transitioned from being just a food aid agency to a food assistance agency fighting hunger worldwide, looking for long-term solutions to the hunger problem that affects more than a billion people worldwide.
As WFP we seek to leverage our hunger response to provide sustainable livelihoods and a future to the poor and the hungry, we are hoping to turn the poor into an investment power to lead the charge towards long term sustainable growth,” he said.
Recalde said WFP had introduced a programme that would sustain the livelihoods of people and solutions to hunger called SLASH that aimed at delivering food based solutions such as food vouchers as a social safety net in areas where access to staple food commodities amongst the vulnerable poor was highly affected by poverty, malnutrition and HIV/AIDS.
He said the United Nations through WFP was currently assisting over 3,000 households in Ndola with food through the food voucher programme.
Reclade said WFP’s goal was to ensure that Zambia was food secure.
Labels: RICALDO PABLO, WFP
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WFP urges adoption of conservation farming
By Agness Changala
Fri 20 Nov. 2009, 04:00 CAT
WORLD Food Programme (WFP) country director Ricaldo Pablo has advised farmers to adopt conservation farming to improve production in view of the reduced inputs in the 2009/2010 farming season.
In an interview, Pablo observed that despite the reduced amount of farming inputs to farmers, fertiliser could not change the way the country produced crops or increase the average productivity per hectare if conservative ways of farming were not implemented.
“Fertiliser per se cannot change the way we produce or increase average productivity. The Fertiliser Support Programme (FSP) at the moment is probably taking a very large amount of the budget of the Ministry of Agriculture and as a result, not allowing for other critical areas of support to the farmers,” he said.
Pablo said the distribution of fertiliser should be targeted at small-scale farmers who he said did not have access to it.
“The target needs to actually be given particularly to the small-scale farmers where the fertiliser never reaches,” he said.
And Pablo said there was need for the government to look at the import and export capacities of agriculture as a way of improving the sector other than providing critical services to farmers.
He said although the government policies in terms of supporting the farmers were broad, fertiliser could not be taken out of context.
Pablo also called for improved agriculture market, access to farming inputs to small scale farmers and support in terms of policy.
He further said commodity exchange allowed for the prices to be set in a transparent manner where all players were working together to set a right price for the commodities.
Pablo said there was also need to re-look at the role of Food Reserve Agency (FRA).
“I think it’s important that the FRA maintains its support and response capacity by continuing with its role in pricing of all agriculture produce,” said Pablo.
Labels: CONSERVATION FARMIING, RICALDO PABLO, WFP
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WFP warns of worse food crisis for the poor
Written by Mutale Kapekele
Monday, June 22, 2009 4:07:34 PM
THE poor are yet to experience the worst food crisis, World Food Program (WFP) executive director Josette Sheeran has said. And Sheeran has urged G8 development ministers meeting in Italy, to remember the needs of the world's hungriest people and continue to support WFP, which is dependent on donations.
Poor households all over the developing world are eating fewer and less nutritious meals with many cutting back on healthcare and schooling for children.
Commenting on the WFP research results on the effects of the financial crisis, which focused on Armenia, Bangladesh, Ghana, Nicaragua and Zambia as case studies and published as G8 development ministers meet in Rome, Sheeran warned that the poor were yet to experience the worst.
"In each of the five countries, we were alarmed that projections were for more hunger and struggling. It demonstrates that for those living on less than $2 a day, the financial crisis is accelerating hunger and the worst is yet to come," Sheeran noted according to the WFP website. "We must not forget the urgent hunger needs around the world, or cut back on support for hungry people. The world's most vulnerable are being hit by the combined effects of the global financial downturn and stubbornly high food prices in many developing world markets. Hunger can lead to dangerous destabilisation, and impact global peace and security."
The studies revealed that the groups most affected by the financial crisis were unskilled workers in urban areas, families who rely on remittances from abroad, workers laid off from the export sectors and those working in mining and tourism.
"The worst hit was not necessarily the poorest of the poor, however, but a new group of people who face a downward slide into poverty," Sheeran said.
Sheeran pointed out that the cost of alleviating world hunger was relatively inexpensive compared to the trillion dollar rescue packages designed to save financial institutions and the automotive industry.
She said this year, WFP needs US $6.4 billion to meet the urgent hunger needs of 105 million people and that a generation could be lost if funds were not poured into her organisation.
"With one in six people going hungry, one child dying every six seconds, and 80 per cent of sub-Saharan African countries facing higher food prices than a year ago, the poor and the hungry are facing one of the biggest crises in our lifetimes," Sheeran said. "It is critical for the world to remember that hunger will have a permanent impact on children and we may lose a generation unless they have adequate access to nutrition during this crisis."
She warned that without food, people could venture into unacceptable options.
"We support the efforts of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) to double global food production by 2050," she said. "At the same time we must remember, as the Nobel laureate and eminent economist, Amartya Sen has said famine is an issue of food access for individuals. Without food, people revolt, migrate, or die. None of these are acceptable options."
Sheeran observed that institutions that were there to help the underprivileged should expand and not contract.
"After the Great Depression, the world created institutions, including World Food Programme, which should expand - not contract - when times are bad. Global food aid is at a 20 year low and we must meet urgent needs to avoid an unprecedented humanitarian crisis," said Sheeran. "At this moment of dramatically growing need, it would be wrong to cut our funding. We have proven our ability to scale up when the world calls on us and equips us with the means to do so. We have also shown that we can do this in a way that supports recipient nations' own long term development strategies to tackle hunger."
Labels: HUNGER, JOSETTE SHEERAN, WFP
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AfDB gives Investrust $3.5m for SME loans
Written by Kabanda Chulu
AFRICAN Development Bank (AfDB) has given Investrust Bank plc US $ 3.5 million line of credit for onward lending to local small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Zambia.
And governments and businesses in Djibouti, Nigeria, Zambia, Mali and Malawi would benefit from a combined multi-purpose funding of US $187 million approved yesterday by the AfDB board of directors in Tunisia.
Releasing the disbursement schedule, AfDB senior communications Officer Felix Njoku stated that Investrust Bank would receive a US $3.5 million line of credit for lending to local SMEs.
He stated that Investrust would also benefit from a US $15,000 technical assistance grant to provide support to SME associations and business development service providers in the country.
“Similarly, a US $10 million line of credit and a US $8 million contribution toward a US $10 million AfDB-USAID partial credit co-guarantee facility was approved for Zanaco Bank of Zambia for the benefit of target SMEs and an associated technical assistance package of US $25,000 will enable Zanaco and Investrust banks, SMEs, and business service providers in Zambia to build capacity,” stated Njoku.
Last August, AfDB president Donald Kaberuka and finance minister Ng’andu Magande signed an agreement for a grant of US $ 500,000 to provide relief to victims of recent flash floods.
The funds will be managed by Zambia’s Disaster Management and Mitigation Unit and the World Food Programme (WFP), which has been supporting various agriculture projects in Zambia.
Currently, the AfDB’s active portfolio in Zambia stands at US $ 220 million and mainly comprises agriculture, water and sanitation, health, education and multi-sector budget support.
Labels: AfDB, CREDIT FACILITIES, DMMU, FELIX NJOKU, INVESTRUST BANK PLC, SMEs, WFP
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Increase crop production—COMESA
By Business Reporter
THE Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) region needs to increase crop production output to mitigate the impact of rising food prices. COMESA investment promotion and private sector development director, Chungu Mwila said the current low levels of productivity were unfavourable for the region hence the need to put up measures to enhance crop production.
Dr Mwila said COMESA members agreed when they met in Seychelles last month to put up a programme with the World Food Programme (WFP) as well as the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) on ways of addressing rising food prices at regional level.
He was speaking in Lusaka yesterday during the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between COMESA and the Eastern African Farmers Federation (EAFF) aimed at promoting the development of agriculture in the region.
Dr Mwila explained that traditional supplies of food such as the USA and Latin America were using wheat and maize to produce bio-fuels in an effort to mitigate the impact of the climate change saying such a situation had contributed to rising food prices on the market.
COMESA Senior agricultural advisor, Cris Muyunda said the continued rising food prices were likely to result in more people getting affected by poverty and worsening malnutrition levels.
EAFF president Philip Kiriro said rising food prices on the international market would make it difficult to import food from other countries.
Mr Kiriro called for increased investment in the agricultural sector as well as putting in place measures aimed at ensuring food sufficiency in the region.
Acting COMESA secretary general ambassador, Nagla El Hussainy, said the MoU would broaden the consultations with the private sector to allow for increased investments in the agricultural sector.
Ambassador Nagla El Hussainy said the agreement would constitute a committed partnership aimed at increasing the competitiveness of the regional agricultural sector.
“In signing this MoU, we commit ourselves to working together to sustainably address the challenge of rising food prices, food insecurity and the poverty situation in the region,”she said.
The specific areas of interest in the MoU include trade in agricultural commodities, development of smallholder farmer programmes, elaborating Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) priorities particular pillar II of CAADP which focus on markets and rural infrastructure development.
Labels: CHUNGU MWILA, COMESA, FAO, WFP
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Zambia among WFP's biggest food suppliers
By Chibaula Silwamba
Thursday August 30, 2007 [04:00]
ZAMBIA is one of the countries that has sold the highest amount of food to the World Food Programme (WFP) in southern Africa in the last five years. According to a press statement released by the WFP southern African regional office in Johannesburg, Zambia sold 285,000 tonnes to the WFP over the last five years at a cost of US$ 62 million.
“Over the past five years, WFP has bought food in South Africa (1,275,000 tonnes; US$259 million), Zambia (285,000 tonnes; US$62 million), Malawi (203,000 tonnes; US$46 million), Mozambique (125,000 tonnes; US$29 million),” the WFP stated, “Lesotho (81,000 tonnes; US$18 million), Namibia (25,000 tonnes; US$7 million), Zimbabwe (20,500 tonnes; US$7 million) and Swaziland (5,500 tonnes; US$1 million).”
The WFP stated that it had bought more than two million tonnes of food on local markets in southern Africa in the last five years - the equivalent of providing a full food basket to 12 million hungry people the whole year.
WFP executive director, Josette Sheeran said the agency had already bought more food in Malawi and Mozambique this year than ever before and, given additional cash contributions, purchases could also hit record levels in Zambia.
“These purchases have provided WFP with the means to help millions of needy people,” said Sheeran from the WFP’s headquarters in Rome in Italy. “At the same time, buying local has been both cost efficient as well as extremely effective in supporting small-scale farmers and stimulating local agricultural economies.”
She said the local purchase benefited small-scale farmers and traders.
“It really is a win-win situation because local purchases benefit surplus-producing small farmers and traders, while ensuring that WFP can provide those in need in those countries and elsewhere in southern Africa with sufficient food in time,” said Sheeran.
The WFP stated that it had spent almost US$430 million in southern Africa since 2002.
“The funds were used to purchase 2,020,000 metric tonnes of cereals, pulses, vegetable oil, corn-soya blend, salt and sugar in eight countries across the region, mainly South Africa, Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique,” the UN food agency stated.
The WFP stated that it was currently focussing its procurement on countries that enjoyed good harvests in 2007 such as Zambia, Mozambique and particularly Malawi, which has a cereal surplus of over one million tonnes this year.
“With parts of southern Africa facing severe food shortages once again, WFP is aiming to assist over four million vulnerable people across the region before the next main harvest in April 2008.
WFP is currently scaling up its operations in the worst-affected countries, particularly Zimbabwe, Lesotho and Swaziland,” the WFP stated. While the bulk of the two million tonnes bought over the last five years in southern Africa was distributed to people hit by a succession of crises in the region, WFP also used some of it to assist vulnerable people facing food shortages in other countries across the continent, including Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, Niger and Somalia.”
The WFP stated that additional donations were urgently required to ensure that WFP reaches all of its targeted beneficiaries in southern Africa over the next seven months.
“Whenever possible, future cash contributions will be used to purchase food either locally or regionally,” stated WFP.
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A good harvest is not good enough unless...
By Editor
Friday March 16, 2007 [02:00]
Indications by the World Food Programme (WFP) that Zambia is likely to have a good harvest this year should offer us some relief. The indications offer some relief because we know the toll that poor harvests in previous years have had on the population in terms of food security. According to the WFP, although Zambia in particular and the southern African region in general experienced some erratic weather pattern this farming season, it is one of the few countries, including Malawi and Mozambique which are likely to register some good harvest this year.
The WFP tells us that despite erratic water, Malawi is expected to yield a bumper harvest again this year, while Zambia and northern Mozambique are also likely to produce favourable harvests that will even present buying opportunities for the UN food agency.
While we may be tempted to celebrate these positive indicators since harvest time is approaching, there is a warning on the other hand that the southern African region could be headed for another year of critical food shortage. Whereas the critical shortage of food may not very much affect Zambia very hard this year, it is important for us to focus our attention on a few areas of concern in terms of food security, whether or not we will record a bumper harvest.
Assuming that the indications by WFP are accurate and they will translate into reality when the harvest period is over, it may as well be the right time for us to take stock of what has happened in the past in terms of ensuring that food reaches all those in need, including putting in place measures that will ensure that those who want to get some cash out of their crops have the opportunity to do so in a manner that is beneficial to them.
We are raising all these concerns because there is a trend, which in fact has become perennial for some areas of the country, where even though the country generally records good harvests to a point where we can even export some of the harvest, several other Zambians will be appealing for relief food. And nobody should blame those Zambians who are perennially faced with food shortages and are always asking for relief food.
We are saying this because we are aware that not all of Zambia’s regions receive adequate amounts of rainfall while other natural factors also affect crop yields in some parts of Zambia. If that is the case, then it behooves those in government that food is somehow distributed in a manner that does not disadvantage other people.
We also have to start looking at whether we should be rushing to export our staple food, which is maize, before we adequately stock up our reserves. We are saying this because experience has shown us that there are times when natural factors affect crop yield to a point where there is generally hunger everywhere in the country and we are forced to either start importing or ask for help from overseas.
Most of us remember the period 2002/2003 and how so bad the situation was that even outsiders like the United States had the liberty to insist that the only food available for relief then was genetically modified maize. Of course, thanks to the government’s decision at that time, we never got to eat the artificially produced maize, neither did any Zambian die from hunger.
However, the important lesson to draw from such past experiences is that it is time we started taking advantage of some of the good farming seasons to start stocking up our reserves for future eventualities.
We know today how some populous nations such as India are proud of the fact that they always have food reserves in excess. It is because of India’s forward planning that our good brothers and sisters were able to offer us some bags of rice in the same 2002/2003 hunger period that we went through as a nation.
Stories are also told in the Bible of how the Egyptians planned and stocked grain to cover a period of seven years of drought to an extent where they were able to feed populations from neighbouring countries. Therefore, instead of rushing to export our annual surpluses, we should start looking at ways of stocking up those excesses and reserve them for eventualities.
Of course, we are mindful that we also have commercial farmers who need to make returns on their huge investments into farming. We are not saying that they should be denied the opportunity to earn some income from their produce. Even for peasant farmers, we know that most of them rely on farming activities to earn a living. Nobody should deny farmers the opportunity to realise some income from their farming activities.
What we are saying is that the government should somehow find a way of making sure that some maize is stocked up in our reserves just for the sake of those years may not be as good as others. Besides, what does food security mean if we do not have reserves that can save us in times of drought? Instead of leaving our silos yawning or as havens for rodents, we think that it is time they were all filled with food because that is their original purpose.
In the same vein, we also hope that the government has this year provided adequate resources to ensure that those farmers who want to sell their produce will have a ready market. Further, we hope that the Food Reserve Agency will this year make sure that farmers are paid their dues in good time so that the delays we saw last year do not affect their farming activities.
As we keep looking forward to witnessing a good harvest in the next few weeks, we think that these are some of the concerns that require attention. A good harvest will not be good enough if some of these concerns are not addressed.
Labels: EDITORIAL, FOOD, WFP
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