USAID: Food Aid and Food Security

Food Aid and Food Security

February 1995

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Preface
Executive Summary
Introduction
Food Security
Measures to Improve Food Security
Food Aid
Food Aid Policy Agenda
Food Aid Management Objectives
Program and Management Policy Conclusions
Wednesday, 11-Jul-2001 16:48:37 EDT

V. Food Aid Policy Agenda
As this paper has documented, there have been significant changes in the food security of developing countries, with progress in many places but real problems in others, particularly in Africa. In addition, the global agricultural economy is changing rapidly, with surpluses being eliminated and greater reliance on market forces. In response, USAID has refined its policy guidance on food aid.
This new guidance will assist USAID field missions and PVOs in planning the orderly evolution of U.S. food aid programs. The broad definition of food security contained in the 1990 amendments to P.L. 480 will continue to govern food-aid program development.⁶
Within that broad frame of reference, USAID will provide implementation guidance on how food commodities will be allocated and utilized to meet food security objectives. This detailed implementation guidance will be developed in consultation with the PVOs and USAID's field missions.

A. Policy Guidance on Food Aid and Sustainable Development
Food aid can be a valuable tool for advancing food security goals in developing countries. The role of food aid in promoting food security must be carefully designed, however, if USAID and the PVOs are to achieve maximum effectiveness from this highly specialized assistance instrument.
In providing food aid, it is essential to both understand the food security problem in the recipient country and clearly identify the food insecure population which U.S. assistance is designed to benefit. This initial analysis--carried out by USAID missions and PVOs--will determine the specific program interventions most likely to succeed.
USAID recognizes there are many ways to promote food security, with appropriate interventions best determined by experienced field managers able to weigh individual country and local community circumstances. USAID's goal--and that of the PVO cooperating sponsors--must be the effective and efficient use of food aid resources. The measure of success in this regard will be the results which programs achieve in terms of sustained improvements in food security.
In general, USAID believes programs designed to enhance agricultural productivity and improve household nutrition have the greatest potential for sustained improvements in food security. This is true in countries where substantial numbers of the poor depend on agriculture for food or income, such as countries in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.
Accordingly, USAID will give priority in allocating food aid resources to programs which enhance agricultural productivity and improve household nutrition in the most food insecure countries. These program and country priorities are not intended to prescribe arbitrary solutions to real world problems nor to restrict the flexibility of field managers. Rather, USAID's intention is to provide guidance on what has worked well and what appears to be in the mainstream of current scientific thinking on how most effectively to improve food security over the long run.
Over time, the application of these priorities is expected to concentrate resources more heavily in Africa (particularly Title III resources) and South Asia and that a growing share of total resources will be used for programs to enhance agricultural productivity and improve household nutrition. However, USAID will continue to approve new food aid activities in other regions of the world and in other program areas (particularly for Title II development programs). In such cases, approval will depend on the ability of field managers to demonstrate that resources will have a sustained impact on food security. In short, the key to program approval will be the ability to demonstrate results.
In focusing the use of P.L. 480 resources, care will be taken not to allow short-term food security goals to create disincentives to longer-term self-reliance in food. A program which focuses on short-term hunger must also address longer-term constraints if USAID is to support sustainable development in food insecure countries. The optimal use of food aid will be where it can have both short and longer term impacts. In many cases, this will involve integration of government-to-government programs such as Title III and PVO programs such as Title II. In most cases, food aid will be programmed in conjunction with other assistance instruments.
To implement this new results-oriented strategy, USAID will shift its oversight focus from inputs and food aid distribution to the results of these integrated programs. PVO partners will have greater control over day-to-day implementation. USAID will focus increasingly on results. Appropriate methods for evaluating these results will be included during the program design phase. The criteria for measurement of successful results must be quantifiable and precise. Detailed implementation guidance for this "Managing for Results" strategy will be developed in consultation with the PVOs.
In allocating funding for both PVO food programs and government-to-government food assistance, priority will be given to programs that enhance agricultural productivity, particularly benefitting small farmers and the poor, and to programs that improve household nutrition for poor families. A broad definition of both these priorities will guide resource allocations. The objective will be to give priority to activities which have significant impact across the entire food system of a recipient country.
The following are illustrative interventions. Priority will be given to these types of activities. However, USAID will always be open to innovative proposals from field missions and PVOs which offer prospects for significant improvements in food security. USAID is committed to giving field managers the flexibility needed to achieve food security results.
Agricultural Productivity programs

Food aid interventions might address: agricultural training, technologies, and practices; agricultural policies, including pricing, marketing, tax and tariff policies; development and funding of private credit institutions; provision and marketing of agricultural inputs; improved on-farm utilization of water resources; marketing and transportation systems which promote the cost-effective movement of food from source to need; food losses associated with ineffective and inefficient harvesting, storage, processing and handling; off-farm microenterprises which improve the marketing of food or agricultural inputs; introduction of cash crops to improve rural incomes; and pilot farming-systems activities at the grass-roots level.

Household Nutrition programs:

Food aid interventions might address: knowledge and practice of health techniques, including those related to nutrition, child care, and sanitation; education to reform practices that limit consumption of a nutritionally adequate diet by certain groups or family members; provision of potable water and sanitation; fortification of foods with vitamins and minerals; pilot programs to improve local storage and household preparation of food; urban feeding programs for vulnerable groups; and demonstration feeding programs designed to develop social safety nets.

B. Policy Guidance on Emergency Food and the Relief-Recovery-Development Continuum
While "relief" food aid and "development" food aid are often considered and managed as distinct entities, they are, in reality, part of a continuum. Long-term food security efforts constitute the best "preventive strategy" for dealing with acute food needs; conversely, how emergency food needs are met can help influence longer term food security.
The distinction between relief and development is one of degree not kind. "At risk" populations are not just those at immediate risk of starvation, but those who live on the edge of economic viability and who represent potential "emergency" victims. Recurrent famines in the Horn of Africa are not "sudden" events caused only by drought, but a manifestation of many complex factors, including decades of war, failed development and disenfranchisement. USAID and PVO cooperating sponsors should seek to design interventions that address food vulnerability at various stages and via different means.
A new framework is needed to assess need and to program resources across the relief-development continuum. Specifically, relief and development activities should focus on key, mutually reinforcing interventions, including:

maintaining productive capacity;
preventing migration;
reinforcing development efforts; and
enhancing disaster management capacity.

Relief interventions must be designed and implemented on the basis of the same principles that guide sustainable development: capacity building, participation and sustainability. Decentralization and human capital development should be pursued, to the maximum extent practicable, in the course of relief operations.
Similarly, developmental activities should be undertaken in a manner that decreases the need for relief intervention (i.e., through addressing vulnerability). Development food aid programs, in conjunction with other USAID resources, should help enable vulnerable groups to develop means to cope with future periods of drought and even political conflict. Programs which help the poor protect against or which mitigate the impact of disasters also facilitate economic and social recovery from crisis. There is need to develop additional interventions which serve both disaster mitigation and long term sustainable development. The following are examples of programs which might serve these twin objectives, recognizing that local circumstances differ greatly and adaption to indigenous cultural priorities is critical to success.

Conservation of natural resources such as watershed management and sustainable harvesting of timber and non-timber products to preserve ecosystem health and biodiversity, and ensure the longevity of these resources.

Diversification of farming systems to introduce drought-resistant cultivars and practices to enhance soil-moisture retention in order to reduce vulnerability to drought.

Improved data collection to better identify vulnerable groups in order to permit targeting of food aid during crises. Such surveys can also identify cultural practices and beneficiaries' perceptions which affect the relief-to-development continuum.

Strengthening local NGOs and their linkages to national institutions to assist with both disaster mitigation and recovery as well as introduction of activities to promote economic growth.

These sorts of programs can increase resilience in the face of natural and man-made disasters and promote rapid return to sustainable development.

⁶ Section 402(s) of P.L. 480 defines food security as "access by all people at all times to sufficient food and nutrition for a healthy and productive life."
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Last Updated on: July 11, 2001