World Food Program USA Blog

USAID’s Shah Calls WFP the “Most Capable” Hunger-fighting Organization

In a speech this week, USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah called the World Food Program (WFP) “the most operationally capable hunger-fighting organization in the world.”

Shah’s speech made clear that the work of the work of WFP is critical to the Obama administration’s new Feed the Future (FTF) initiative to fight global hunger. Shah emphasized how WFP’s role in both humanitarian relief and development could provide long-term solutions to global hunger. Feed the Future builds the foundation for a new partnership between USAID and WFP.

“I believe right now is a unique opportunity for us to partner in a different and more efficient way,” said Shah about WFP. “The goal of this partnership would be to improve the ruthless efficiency and focus with which we collectively solve the challenge of global hunger.”

Shah pointed to WFP’s Purchase for Progress (P4P) program as an example of how the organization uses use its innovative development initiatives and purchasing power to transform the lives of the world’s hungriest people.

Through the P4P program WFP utilizes its purchasing power to buy food from small-scale, local farmers to strengthen local markets and encourage agricultural development. When these farmers can count on WFP as their buyer they are more willing to diversify their crops and increase investments. A more stable market is developed, leading to improved accessibility and availability of food and previously unseen economic opportunities for communities.

“[WFP is] often the largest buyer of food in the countries that we collectively call priority Feed the Future countries,” Shah said. “[WFP] interfaces directly with food producers, with producer organizations and with food companies. The power of [WFP’s] purchasing is tremendous and I’m glad to hear of the great progress in the P4P initiative.”

A cooperative effort between USAID and WFP as part of the FTF effort would provide remarkable opportunities for combating global hunger with both agencies focused on providing sustainable solutions to hunger.

As President Obama said in announcing the new United States commitment to hunger, “Aid is not an end itself. The purpose of foreign assistance must be creating the conditions where foreign assistance is no longer needed.”

If WFP and FTF are truly successful then one day there will no longer be a need for them. That is a future to which we can all look forward.

-Kayla Auletto
Public Policy Intern
Friends of WFP

Feed the Future: How the U.S. Government is Fighting Global Hunger

The U.S. government recently launched their new global hunger and food security initiative, "Feed the Future" (FTF), which will serve as a vital tool in reaching the Millennium Development Goal (MGD) of reducing the number of people dealing with extreme hunger and poverty by 50 percent by 2015. FTF sets out the U.S. government’s approach to “sustainably reduce global hunger and poverty” and signals a recommitment by the United States to this MDG.

FTF will focus investments on twenty countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. These countries were chosen based on their level of need and poverty rates, as well as the opportunities that they present for regional growth and partnerships. The United States will assist these countries in creating Country Investment Plans (CIPs) that will guide them in their agricultural development and nutritional improvement. Investments in the countries will occur in two phases and will track the progress and continued commitment of each country. FTF will be overseen by a U.S. global hunger and food security coordinator who will oversee a whole-of-government approach.

Through this initiative, the U.S. government will focus on strengthening their partnerships with three groups: the countries, multilateral organizations, and other key stakeholders, such as non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and the private sector. By allowing focus countries to create their own CIPs the United States is letting each country target their own needs and create a vision for their future. Partnerships with multilateral organizations will encourage global and regional cooperation, paving the way for regional programs and initiatives. Additionally, by partnering with NGOs and the private sector, the U.S. government is recognizing the vital resources and experience that these groups contribute in the fight against global hunger.

This new initiative represents a more comprehensive and internationally coordinated effort. By focusing on issues such as gender and climate change, in addition to agriculture and nutrition, the U.S. government is adopting a progressive strategy. It’s exciting to see such an approach to address global hunger, and we’re waiting anxiously to see how FTF progresses.

-Kayla Auletto
Public Policy Intern
Friends of WFP

Severe Rains Affect Guatemala: Report from Inside the Country

Imagine living in a community far up the side of mountain, settled deep into areas where there are no longer any roads.  In these areas, when summer comes it is too dry and droughts ensue, ensuring your crops will perish.  When the winter comes, with it come the heavy and unforgiving rains. Anything farmers try to plant will likely be washed away. This is the story of a community we visited this week, where the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) has already declared an emergency situation or EMOP.

Imagine another community, best accessible by a one hour boat ride across an expansive lake. This community is prone to flooding, and an emergency is only declared when the water rises 2.5 meters. Before that, community members are accustomed to the knee high deep waters, and the flooding of their homes.  This community lives on the edge of every day, and rains can change everything.

These are just two stories of villages in Guatemala that are living at a tipping point. Their lives depend on reasonable amounts of rain, just enough to grow their food, but not too much to wash away their livelihoods. 

This past week in Guatemala, a group of 8 travelers have been in the Izabal Province to learn more about WFP programs in the area and now, two days after the official end of our trip to the field, we are still in Guatemala.

On Thursday, after a ten hour bus ride, we finally made it back to Guatemala City for a debrief with the WFP Country Director. Until this point, the trip had progressed without a hitch.  We learned about maternal and child health, we learned about Purchase for Progress and questioned why we joined this excursion in the first place.  (For a full recap of the WFP Committee trip, here’s a great summary.)

And then, as we walked to eat a traditional meal, we felt little rocks falling from the sky.  At first it felt like small pieces of hail, and given the constant rain, this explanation made sense. Then we looked again; our outstretched hands were covered in tiny specks of dark gray.  Unsure what to make of it, we kept walking.  In the restaurant a television was on and the news showed images of an active volcano.  The Pacaya volcano, only 20 miles from Guatemala City where we were, was letting out lava and rocks, and ash (more like sand) was falling from the sky. Communities in the immediate area of the volcano were evacuated.  The next day, in clear daylight, we could see the remnants of Pacaya’s activity: the whole city was covered in gray; everything looked like it had a layer of soot. And that was only the beginning of nature’s commotion in Guatemala.

Tropical depression Agatha is now making its way from the Pacific coast inland, and across the country.  The torrential downpours have already reached us, and we’re still at the outskirts of the storm.  The news here has reports of collapsed bridges, overflowing rivers, and the first signs of mudslides. No one yet knows for sure how the storm will unfold in Guatemala, though the government has raised the country’s alert level, and declared a state of calamity. Officially, the rainy season has not even started here. As our group of volunteers deals with one cancelled flight after another, and the possibility of being in-country more than an extra week, we have also been thinking a lot about Guatemalan communities affected by these weather patterns. (As an aside, the group of WFP Committee travelers is safe and well. We are all making the most of our extra days here, and concerned about how this affects the very people we met this past week).

When I think back to the communities I described at the beginning of my post, I’m left wondering, “How will they deal with this tropical storm? Are the communities incommunicado once the floods and mudslides begin?"

When the volcano first erupted, international media was slow to pick up the story. CNN was the first to publish a mini update, but beyond that, Google searches produced little results in the first twenty four hours. Now with the first tropical storm of the season, the news is paying attention, showing images of flooded streets in the capital.

However, before all this began, when the droughts left Izabal with food shortages, and WFP declared communities an emergency operation, there was very little attention. Does it take a natural disaster of this magnitude to bring attention to the needs of Guatemalans?

-Jessica Alatorre
Outreach Associate

Friends of WFP

A Humbling Experience in One of Africa's Largest Slums

By Senator George McGovern

Hunger is something I have fought tirelessly by encouraging a global commitment to school meals and nutrition. I am currently on a 10-day visit to Kenya and Uganda to see United Nations World Food Program (WFP) projects serving the same cause. This visit comes 50 years after President John F. Kennedy appointed me the first director of the U.S. Food for Peace Program.

On Tuesday, I visited the Nairobi slum of Kibera—the largest slum in East and Central Africa—with more than 1 million people. Life is hard and most residents struggle daily to put a meal on the table. Many of the children in Kibera are orphans, having lost their parents to HIV/AIDS.

I want to share with you a touching experience when I met Lilian Adhiambo, a 22-year-old woman who is HIV positive and lives in Kibera. Lilian, through her HIV-infected child, receives WFP food assistance through a program feeding children who are HIV positive and their families.

With Lilian and her child, I saw the important role that nutrition plays in the management of the disease. Lilian said that with the WFP food, she and her child, together with the rest of the family, are able to lead a normal life and that she can even engage in small income-generating activities which, however, don’t always do very well because of the high levels of poverty in the slums.

Amid the squalor of Kibera, Lilian’s house, though mud walled and with a dirt floor, was sparkling clean and her sparse furniture was neatly arranged in her small room. The resilience I saw in her humbled me.

I danced with a 10-year-old lady from Stara Rescue Centre, and listened to poetry and songs from children in the centre, which is both a school and haven for destitute and orphaned children.

The poems and songs were about the nutritious lunch they receive daily in school because of WFP and how it helps them concentrate in class and encourages them to stay in school. At that moment, I was proud of the fact that in 2001, together with my colleague Senator Robert Dole, we pushed for the McGovern-Dole program which supports WFP’s school meals in Kenya.

I firmly believe that school meals are the most important form of assistance that the United States can give in Kenya and other parts of the world. This is because school meals provide both a safety net for hungry children and an incentive to keep them in school so they can learn for a better future.

Urgent: Call your Senator today to help feed millions in need!

We need your help today! This afternoon members of the Senate Appropriations Committee will decide how much money to spend on life-saving emergency food assistance for millions of mothers and children affected by man-made and natural disasters.

We need YOU to help ensure that the Senate provides enough funding this year to sustain critical food assistance programs in places such as Haiti, Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Pakistan and Sudan. Without additional funding some of the hungriest and most vulnerable people in the world could be left without food.

It only takes one minute of your time and can save millions of lives! Please reach out to your Senator by 3:30 pm EST today!

 

How to make a call:

1. Click here to look up your Senator.
2. Dial (866) 569-FOOD by 3:30 pm Eastern Standard Time today!
3. Ask to be connected to the office of your Senator.
4. Say: “I would like Senator _______ to ensure that there is a minimum of $580 million in the Supplemental Spending Bill for emergency food assistance needs.” 
5. Additional talking points can be found here.
6. When you have made your calls forward this information on to a friend!

Wireless Technology Increases Efficiency and Reduces Error in Burundi

Though the United Nations World Food Program's (WFP) basic mission - providing food and agricultural assistance to the hungry - remains constant, its methods are constantly improving as new technologies become available. A recently installed 3G high-speed wireless internet network in Burundi has transformed the way WFP works with Burundi's poor to ensure that their food needs are being met. 

In the past, WFP staff in Burundi relied on pens and paperwork to track the country's food supply. But because Burundi is a small country, people can be found using technology such as cell phones even in remote rural areas. Now WFP's field agents can use PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants) to input data from Burundian families about what they eat and how much it costs. The PDAs not only reduce the margin of error but also save time and reduce the need for paper.

An effective means of tracking and providing food assistance is critical in Burundi, where WFP estimates as much as 50 percent of the population is chronically malnourished. Fifteen years of civil war left the country's economy in tatters, and natural disasters such as floods and drought are common. WFP currently reaches an average of 600,000 people in Burundi per month through programs such as food for training, school meals and mother-and-child health and nutrition.

The Burundi PDA project comes after two successful PDA programs in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Mozambique. Wireless technology has also been implemented in food voucher programs in Zambia and Iraq.

-Alli Bailey
Communications Assistant
Friends of WFP

Innovations and Urbanization

The movement of people from rural areas to urban centers is happening all over the world. Ultimately, this shift in population leads to a condensed increase in the demand for food. Many markets are unable to handle this change fast enough and the quality and quantity of food ends up decreasing. The only way to alleviate this rising food insecurity is for the United Nations, local governments and local organizations to all work together.  

This growing issue has inspired creative solutions from stakeholders. In February, the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) launched a food voucher operation in Burkina Faso. In cities, food distribution is often difficult; with vouchers people can purchase their necessities (maize, cooking oil, sugar, salt and soap) from local vendors who have a contract with WFP rather than travel great distances to receive food. The added benefit of this system is that local merchants will then have steady income, ultimately improving the local economy.

Urbanization has forced people to be creative in food production as well. In Mathare, a slum in Nairobi, Kenya, locals have started the “farm-in-a-sack” project which yields crops in only a few weeks and takes up very little space.

The AfriGadget Blog highlights similar innovations in urban farming like the Keyhole Gardens in Lesotho and Vertical Farming in Kibera. These creative grassroots solutions, in addition to assistance from local governments, non-governmental organizations and international groups, are an important step in the fight against urban food insecurity.

More than half of the world’s population lives in urban areas, and as this map shows, this rate is going to grow substantially in the future.  These kinds of innovations in food distribution and cultivation, which improve access to food, will only become more critical as this population grows.

-Kate Stritzinger
Outreach Intern
Friends of WFP

WFP Expresses Concern Over African Land Acquisitions

The trading, selling and leasing of African land to foreign powers dates back to colonialism. However, in recent years there has been an unprecedented increase in land acquisitions all over the continent. This plays a huge role in the availability of farmland and ultimately food to local populations, because when land is traded it is often used to produce exported goods. Around 20 countries (including Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Sudan and many others) have leased tens of millions of acres of land to foreign powers. After the global food crisis in 2008, the international community is taking these land acquisitions seriously. 

In a recent Reuters article, the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) expressed concern over African land lease deals. Currently, the shift in ownership has not caused any serious decline in food acquisition, but with the shifting global climate the future of arable farmland in Africa is in question.

Sheila Sisulu, WFP Deputy Executive for Hunger Solutions, has noted the success of European subsidies to reduce dependence on food imports and to increase local farming. She has suggested African governments could adopt similar practices to improve food security in their own countries. In order to combat corruption and potential conflict, Sisulu said, “There needs to be a principle, a code of conduct and transparency, it needs to be out in the open and not done through secret deals.”

-Kate Stritzinger
Outreach Intern
Friends of WFP

Mauritania Joins Countries in Sahel Region Facing Increased Food Shortage

The looming food shortages in West Africa’s Sahel region have spread from Niger and Chad to nearby Mauritania. The United Nations World Food Program (WFP) estimates that the number of those afflicted by hunger will increase to 250,000 people this year.  Of this population, around 150,000 are experiencing severe hunger, or on the verge of starvation. 

Mauritania is one of the world’s least developed nations, ranking  154 out of 182 countries, according to the 2009 U.N. Human Development Index. The food insecurity in this country stems from the fact that they can only produce a quarter of the food necessary to feed their 3.3 million people. In addition, WFP, along with the Mauritanian government, recently released an assessment saying that due to a lack of seeds the harvest will decrease by 24 percent in 2010.
 
The Mauritanian government believes that it will be able to handle this surge in hunger, and plans to distribute 6,000 tons of food; however, WFP is less optimistic. “Unfortunately, we do not have enough food in our warehouse,” WFP Country Director Guy Gauvreau told Reuters AlertNet.  ”The timing is bad because our reserves are depleting and the demand is increasing,”

Learn more about WFP’s efforts in Mauritania or about the food shortage in Chad and Niger.

Auburn University Students Combat Global Hunger

Auburn University, in the eastern plains of Alabama, is marching against global hunger tomorrow. This 3-day, 60-mile trek will begin on Auburn’s campus and end in Montgomery on the steps of the State Capitol building. The first Hunger March was in 2008, to raise awareness about hunger; it was the brainchild of students Emma Keller and Haley Walker Killebrew. 

“The issue of hunger is something that has weighed heavy on my heart since I was about 15 years old,” Keller told NBC. “I traveled to Haiti, which as you know is the poorest country in the western hemisphere, and it changed my life. After seeing the things that I saw, suffering that no one should have to endure, I knew that I had to do something.”

Keller and Killebrew are not alone in their fight against hunger with the support of Auburn’s student organization, the Committee of 19. The name stems from the 19 cents it once cost to feed one child for one day through WFP’s school meals program. The first march in October 2008 was a huge success with over 60 students marching. This year they are pushing up their goal to 150 students. Student organizer Courtni Ward has invited politicians on all levels to show their support for this cause at the ending rally, which will take place at the end of this trek on March 29.

“We will arrive around 12 pm and the rally should last about an hour,” she said. “After that, it is up to the students to speak with those present, share their experiences and their visions about ending hunger and hunger-related issues locally.”
 
The Committee of 19 is inspiring awareness at its university, and on a local and state level as well. Its members are setting the example that college students play a critical role not only in the future, but in the present as well. To learn more about this movement, visit their Hunger March page.

-Kate Stritzinger
Outreach Intern
Friends of the World Food Program