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ENABLING FOOD AID FOR DEVELOPMENT POLICY REVIEW OF THE INDIA COUNTRY PROGRAMME (April 1997 – December 2002) 29 November – 22 December 1999 New Delhi
This report reflects the
conclusions of a mission 1 that visited
India over the period 29th November to 22nd December
1999 to undertake a mid-term review (MTR) of the India Country Programme
(ICP). The MTR took place after the endorsement of WFP’s new policy framework
2 on food aid and development (FAAD). The
new framework argues for future WFP assistance in five principal areas. These
include (i) enabling young children and expectant and nursing mothers to meet
their special and nutrition-related health needs; (ii) enabling poor
households to invest in human capital through education and training; (iii)
making possible for poor families to gain and preserve assets; (iv)
mitigating the effects of natural disasters in areas vulnerable to recurring
crises of this kind, and (v) enabling households, which depend on degraded
natural resources for their food security, to make a shift to more
sustainable livelihoods. The review differs
somewhat from others in the past in that the major objective is to assess the
consistency of the ICP against goals outlined under FAAD, and steps required
to reorient any future ICP so that it fully meets FAAD objectives. It is
issue oriented and does not attempt to evaluate programme implementation in
its details. It attempts to take a fresh view of the programme in its
totality and provides a vision or strategy for the future, suggesting
modifications and changes to the current programme to ease the transition. As
a consequence, the report is titled as a Policy Review of the India Country
Programme. The report is supported by independent annexes, which goes into greater
details of the current programmes. The India Country Programme
(April 1997-Dec 2002) The current India Country
Programme is comprised of two virtually independent activities: assistance to
vulnerable women and children through support to the Integrated Child
Development Services (ICDS) programme of the Government; and providing food
security and development support to tribal and scheduled caste people in
isolated forest areas. A third activity, supporting rural development through
irrigation and settlement, was terminated in March 1998. The programme was
approved by the Executive Board in January 1997 for a period of five years
but will require to be extended to the end of December 2002 so as to be in
line with the UNDAF process. It was approved with an allocation of about US $
182 million equivalent to about 500,000 MT for core activities. Provision was
made for an additional 200,000 MT for supplementary activities, resources
permitting. WFP’s support to the ICDS
programme of the Government 3
covers selected districts in the six states of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh,
Uttar Pradesh, Assam, Orissa and Kerala. The current beneficiary coverage is
estimated at some 2.7 million, spread across 41546 Aganwadi Centres (AWC)
in some 41 districts. The programme provides supplementary feeding for about
25 days a month through on-site feeding as well as take-home rations to
expectant and nursing women and children under the age of 6 years of age. The
programme aims at improving the nutritional status of expectant and nursing
women and pre-school children through two approaches. The first is the
provision of nutritional supplements through the development and distribution
of a low-cost fortified blended food supplement (locally trade named as India-mix).
The second aims at improving the effectiveness of the ICDS programme
through creating awareness, increasing community participation and
entrepreneurship and promoting the convergence of the different services
provided under ICDS (health, nutrition and education). Major aspects have
been the provision of training to functionaries and collaboration with NGOs
in special pilot activities. This has included specific initiatives
such as the ‘Better Health and Nutrition Project’ (BHNP) with CARE in
Rajasthan; the ‘Hajo Soru’ – Improving Child Survival through ICDS, a
district based initiative with a local NGO, New Concept, in Banswara
(Rajasthan); the ‘Community Entrepreneurship for Production of Complementary
Food with a local group, KRIBHCO, in Madhya Pradesh; and Strengthening
Project Management and Pre-school Education with UNESCO. Pilot initiatives
have extended beyond those of the current programmes and have included
support to an NGO for a programme directed at urban street children in the
slums of Calcutta in West Bengal. Improving the food
security of tribal and scheduled caste peoples in isolated forest areas, the
second dimension of WFP’s operation is being undertaken in the six States of
Bihar, Orissa, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan. Daily
food rations are provided at concessional rates to forest dependent tribe and
scheduled caste daily
wageworkers engaged in forest department activities. This has largely been
effected through the system of Joint Forestry Management (JFM) introduced by
the Government. Funds thus generated (amalgamated under the category of
‘Generated Funds’) are invested in productive community assets that broaden
and improve the long-term food security of the people with special attention
to women. The total number of beneficiaries had been estimated at slightly
over 600,000 people from about 121,650 poor families. In addition, the country
office has responded to emergency needs when required. In this context,
agreement has been reached with the Government for flexibility in the use of
resources. This has allowed WFP to respond urgently to the needs of women and
children in the event of a disaster, as in the case of the floods in Assam
(in July-September 1997) as well as that of two districts in Madhya Pradesh
this year. Two protracted relief and recovery operations (PRRO) have been
prepared to support the rehabilitation of the Orissa cyclone victims. One is
in operation and the second needs to be approved by the Executive Board.
These will be implemented through the Department of Women and Child
Development and the Department of Rural Development and various NGOs. In
addition, WFP plans to join IFAD to support a project in the poorer areas of
the state with explicit adherence to the FAAD guidelines. Overall, the ICP is being
implemented in eight states of India (see Appendix for a tabular
presentation). However, both programmes are implemented in only four of the
eight states. Thus, of a total coverage of 96 districts in the country, only
16 districts (17 percent) have both programmes. Three quarters of the
beneficiaries and an estimated 80 percent of the food resources have been
utilised in the four states of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and
Orissa. Given the more or less self-sufficient level of the national food
supply situation, a major part of the food resources provided by WFP has been
procured from local purchases. Currently about a third (35 % in 1999) of the
food resource, comprising corn soya blend (and a small quantity of vegetable
oil, pulses and some rice), is imported. Assessment of the Programme
in terms of FAAD priorities At a global and strategic
level, the focus of the current ICP already bears close resemblance to the
new FAAD paradigm. There are several elements that conform to the FAAD policy
and provide building blocks for the new country programme. For example, the
exclusive attention of the ICDS programme to children below the age of 6
years, expectant and nursing mothers, and adolescent girls is in line with
the priorities outlined under FAAD. It is also in line with WFP’s commitment
to women and the creation of human assets through the provision of food,
training and education. Similarly, the focus on enabling poor households
belonging to tribals and scheduled caste communities to gain and preserve
assets also reflects FAAD priorities. What is missing is the complementary
effect of these positive elements to give poor people scope for their
ingenuity and efforts, leveraging their access to the benefits of development. Both programmes appear to
be reasonably well implemented. Food distributed at the AWCs under the ICDS
programme plays the role of a food-based income transfer for poor families
and a likely role as a nutritional supplement 4
. The food provides an important incentive for children’s attendance at
pre-school education and encourages mothers’ attendance for nutrition and
health counseling. The positive impact that the provision of take-home
rations for families with severely malnourished children and the feeding of
children with micronutrient fortified blended called Indiamix on children is
widely acknowledged. Nevertheless, recent overall evaluation of ICDS has
suggested areas of improvement in operational modalities, which would improve
and increase its prospective impact. The situation with
respect to the Tribal Development Programme is different. As indicated
earlier, the Tribal Development Programme is based on two fronts. The first
consists of a food-for-work intervention in the form of a subsidised
supplement to wages received for seasonal employment in Forestry Department
activities. The second consists of productive investments at the village
level based on cash funds generated through a deduction from the forestry
wages and allocated to selected village communities for use in ways agreed by
the community, district officials and WFP. The provision of seasonal
employment for participants, even if it has been considerably below target,
provides some measure of food consumption support in the short term. Where
the programme falters is that the support for long-term food security
implicit in the investments derived through generated funds has not generally
benefited the same group of people. Given the manner, in which it has been
implemented, the tribal development programme can in fact be characterized as
being composed of two sub-programmes. There is the short-term employment
generation programme based on forestry activities (largely afforestation work),
and there is the longer-term interventions aimed at increasing food security
on a more sustainable basis. There is little doubt that Joint Forestry
Management (JFM) supported under the programme has had significant pay-off in
terms of community participation and ownership of projects, a re-orientation
of forestry staff towards working together with villagers and the value of
re-invested funds for productivity enhancement. Similarly, the importance and
potential of micro planning has also been recognised. However, there is a
need for a more coordinated overlap between the short-term and long-term
support. As it currently stands, there is perhaps too much of a forestry
determined approach to what is ostensibly a more general rural development
exercise aimed at empowering poor families to gain and preserve assets and
move to more sustainable livelihoods through the use of food. This is also
evidenced from the requests for investments made from the ‘generated funds’.
A more generalised "rural development" approach, where forestry
plays only a part along with other sectors, would enable a more sustainable
intervention in tribal area development. Future Programme Issues Rationale for
continuing WFP operations: leveraging action-changing attitudes Variously described as
India's silent emergency, the quantitative elements of poverty and
deprivation in India are overwhelming and pervasive. Despite substantial
success in agricultural production and economic growth, India has the largest
number of poor people and malnourished children in the world. Thirty per cent
of the urban population and forty nine per cent of the rural population live
in poverty 5 . In numerical terms it is difficult to
come to terms with this staggering figure. Thirty per cent of the population
still lives on less than 1700 kcal per day. If the global figures of poverty
are depressing, that of specific groups of the population is catastrophic.
India alone accounts for 40 per cent of the world's malnourished children while
containing 20 per cent of the global child population. More than half of its
children below four years of age is moderately or severely malnourished, 30
per cent of new borns are significantly underweight, and 60 per cent of
Indian women are anaemic. The rationale for continuing WFP’s current
involvement in India both through support to children and expectant and
nursing mothers and for poor families to gain and preserve assets remains
strong. Two aspects however
warrant a more careful enunciation of WFP’s rationale for operations in
India. The first is India’s current position of relative national food
self-sufficiency 6 and the second is the overall limits to
WFP’s resource allocation. In the first instance, the country’s aggregate
food surplus/self-sufficiency can itself be considered to be transitory and,
in any case, does not translate into access to food for the poor. Food-based
safety net programmes such as the Public Distribution System (PDS) are
costly. At the same time, the rationale for targeted interventions to assist
the poor in the creation of sustainable assets remains as strong as ever.
This is particularly so if it can be shown to have induced the Government to
have taken some policy decisions and/or provided additional resources in
directions developed through WFP interventions. In the second instance, the
quantum of WFP’s food contribution to India is far too limited when seen as a
percentage of total production and is unlikely to make a dent in the overall
problem of food insecurity for the poor. There is also a need to secure an
agreement with the Government to allow flexibility in the use of resources.
While there is some flexibility with respect to the use of WFP resources,
agreement of the Government on this would be required in the future should
the Government agree to match WFP resources from its own stocks. Taking the two aspects
together, WFP’s assistance should therefore be seen in terms of its
contribution towards providing a critical momentum and direction rather
than a critical mass in the fight against hunger and poverty. WFP can and
should play a major role in leveraging policy and resources through advocacy
and the adoption of a consortium approach with other partners. The
demonstration effects of novel institutional models developed by WFP in, for
instance, improving the nutritional status of women and children will have a
significant impact and leadership in the prevailing aid environment.
This applies as much in the generation of information identifying the
location of the poor, such as in the creation of a food insecurity map for
the country, as in the means of addressing the constraints to food security. Operational focus:
children and women and providing access In specific operational
terms, the first priority for WFP operations would remain the large
population of malnourished children and women who constitute what has been
termed as the "paradox of South Asia". This constitutes the highest
levels of child and maternal malnutrition co-existing with relatively high
aggregate levels of food supply, even with adequate food consumption 7 . Studies have shown that women suffer
from substantial chronic energy deficiency (CED) and micro-nutrient
malnutrition largely due to behavioural factors that determine women’s access
to household food as the last and least. Similarly, protein energy and
micro-nutrient malnutrition is also dominant among children, particularly
girls, due to behavioural factors which indicate that, despite their being
able to feed themselves, girl children receive less food than boys and are
conditioned to restrict their consumption in favour of males. Food alone
cannot address these behaviour related aspects of malnutrition. However, the
provision of Indiamix by WFP provide perhaps the best current method
of providing micro-nutrients to women and children in India. Therefore, while the
focus on ICDS will continue, there is a need to take a slightly broader view.
For this particular group, this is likely to require a change in focus that
would be built around qualitative and quantitative goals for women and girls
that fall under the rubric of food utilisation as distinct from production or
access. Thus, where ‘the origins of child malnutrition can be traced to maternal
deprivation and discrimination against girls and women in South Asia’ 8 , or gender inequity is one of the ‘most
important factors responsible for the high level of undernourishment’ 9 or that India’s malnutrition is ‘clearly
linked to inappropriate caring and feeding practices rather than only to food
availability or household food security 10
, WFP’s role should not be limited to provide food supplements alone. It
should also aim towards inducing a behavioural change. This would
include change not only in the care and feeding practices 11 among women and children but also as to how women are viewed
and cared for by society. The programmes should also focus on their
socio-economic status, their active presence in decision making, their
equality in access to productive resources and human capital formation and
their access to health, food and services that will allow a breakthrough
against the persistently high levels of malnutrition. The best of WFP’s
existing pilot projects (such as in Banswara and Jabhua) provide prototype
models of innovation, collaboration and synergy. In such cases, effective
partnerships have been developed with district departments and NGOs. Advocacy
on behalf of women and children has been raised to new levels, novel
materials, training and participatory approaches have been devised,
additional non-food donors have been encouraged to consider potential
replication, and synergy has been sought among separate projects (ICDS
activities coupled with income reinvestment from generated funds). Where it
works well, the positive effects are demonstrable, although current
monitoring and evaluation data typically need to be improved to capture many
of these benefits. In addition to the focus
on nutrition and pre-school education, support to children could be expanded.
Indeed, the argument for greater support could be made from the perspective
of child labour. While WFP does not have a formal policy on this
specific issue, the FAAD policy clearly places emphasis on the importance of
meeting not only the needs for physical growth, but also that of mental and
psycho-social development that are associated with a formal education. A new
country programme could provide leverage on this issue in three ways. First,
by having a louder voice in advocacy activities (including collaboration with
UNICEF). Second, by reducing the opportunity costs of sending children
(especially girls) to school through household income generating investments.
Third, through greater direct support of primary education through class
construction, the provision of school meals, and perhaps the provision of
take-home rations for girls education and non-formal education for women. In fact, it could be
argued that the support to children should be expanded to cover the provision
of food in schools – a sort of food for education programme. There is already
evidence that shows that the provision of food in schools acts partly as an
incentive for parents to allow children to attend, and also encourages
communities themselves to demand that teachers actually be present and that
study materials are available. The provision of education is perhaps the
greatest countervailing force against child labour. Given the recognition
that a major index of poverty is inadequate food access due to low purchasing
power, targeted interventions aimed at making it possible for poor families
to gain and preserve assets, one of the FAAD priorities should remain as a
major vehicle for food aided development. This aspect of WFP assistance
allows both access to food in the short run and prospects of sustainability
through access to an asset in the long run. WFP’s long association in the
food for work programme is evidence of its success particularly where it has
been appropriately linked to gaining and preserving assets. For the tribal
and other scheduled caste people, interventions aimed at providing food for
work while establishing an asset would continue to provide an equally
important rationale for WFP. The ideal combination would be, of course, to
have a combined focus for all actions in the same areas. Target Orientation:
people, zones and states The initial selection of
the States in which the ICP has been operational was based on relative
parameters of food deprivation, malnutrition, negative female bias, and
localised risks. This, in turn, A geographically based approach resulted in
an operational area scattered across eight states of the country. This
resulted in a dispersion of operations with negative implications for
management. Decisions have been taken to withdraw operations from Kerala and
Gujarat (partly on the grounds of reduced resource levels, partly on
substantive grounds relating to better than average levels of nutrition). The
remaining six states (Assam, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Rajasthan and
Uttar Pradesh) had the highest rates of poverty and child mortality in the
country during the mid-1980s 12.
As of the mid-1990s, Orissa and Uttar Pradesh had climbed significantly in
the economic rankings (based on a poverty head count index), while Maharastra
and Karnataka both fell down towards the lower end of the ranking 13 . The question of what
characteristics are to be used in the selection of project areas and whether
beneficiary, "people" targeting would also feature in any future
programme remains an issue. In the case of the ICDS interventions,
malnutrition is worst in children under two years of age, and among women,
tribal populations and scheduled castes in the large northern states (Measham
and Chatterjee 1999). In this sense, WFP assistance in the ‘big four’ BIMARU
states (Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh) can be justified at
a macro level, despite variability in absorptive capacity, institutional
responsiveness and impact. A case can also be made for Orissa and Assam based
on the concentrations of castes and tribal peoples and risks of natural
disasters. In the case of
interventions for the creation of assets for poor people in the tribal areas,
the necessity for changing the current forestry determined food for work
programme to a more generalised approach, has implications on two fronts. The
first is on the nature of the investments suitable for food for work, such
as, for instance, in the development of common property resources. The
second, would be the requirement for some form of beneficiary targeting since
the benefits from some of the investments would not be equally accessible,
such as in the construction of a micro dam. It has to be recognised that the
use of a specific sectoral approach, such as forestry in the current tribal
development programme, will not identify or determine the beneficiaries. On
the contrary, identification of the poor particularly the most vulnerable
women should precede the identification of the activities or investments that
should need to be made. Herein lies the essence of the people centred
approach that should be adopted by WFP in India. To its credit, the ICP
has already initiated elements of this approach in one part of the tribal
development programme: the use of ‘generated funds’. However, this should be
adopted as the general approach for all its activities. Consequently, the
targeting of people should focus attention on the role and responsibility
of the VAM (Vulnerability Analysis Mapping) units. VAM units will play an
important role in collating and analysing information for appropriate area
targeting according to the characteristics of the beneficiary population. A
thorough VAM process highlights missing information as much as it generates
maps based on existing data. In the immediate short run, a great deal more
scale-sensitive information should be collected and processed (including new
Census and National Sample Survey data). As such the first state-wide
Vulnerability Profiles should be seen as visual pictures of the poverty
profile of the population rather than analytical outputs to guide
targeting—that will come later. Procedures and tasks are
already underway to establish composite indices that prioritise ‘need’, and
help in assessing development capacities and opportunities by location,
clarify logistical constraints, identify other development partners, build up
a database for use in monitoring and evaluation, and specify potential risks
of natural disasters. All of these will be crucial to prioritisation of
potential zones of operation at sub-state level. However, it should be
understood that a generic ‘food insecurity maps’ cannot be prepared in short
order. There remains limited understanding of the requisite indicators, and
their inter-relationships in the Indian context (especially if WFP adopts the
food utilisation/gender aspects as one of the entry points). In this regard,
a clear distinction must always be kept between use of the term ‘hunger’ in
an advocacy sense (such as the Hunger Free Zone concept), and its use
in a rigorous targeting process. The Hunger Zone idea currently promulgated
by the US-based Hunger Project and the M.S. Swaminathan Foundation is a
useful umbrella for raising political and grassroots support for a cause. The
Hunger Free activities in states like Tamil Nadu are focused on many of the
constraints that concern WFP, including poor anthropometric status,
micronutrient deficiencies, extreme poverty, inadequate health services, and
low food production/non-farm employment. Collaboration with this initiative
could be useful to WFP within India where consensus and coalition building
are important. There may also be options for field level collaboration where
interests are focused on the same districts. Community Based
Approach: process and participation A necessary adjunct to a
people focused approach for the future will be the imperative to ensure an
active participation of the community in both design and implementation of
the programmes. In the context of the revised focus on inducing behavioral
changes in the ICDS programme, this would mean focusing on ways and means to
raise community awareness against the gender-bias (for males as opposed to
females). Similarly, a generalised programme for the development of tribals
and other poor and underprivileged would need to be based on a participatory
process that involves the community in design, such as in the identification
of activities that assist in the creation of assets, as well as in
implementation. Community participation can and has been shown to have a
significant impact on programme sustainability. The elements of such a
community-based approach is currently inherent in part of the tribal
development programme, specifically in the Joint Forestry Management and in
deciding on the use of the generated funds. However, the overall programme
itself needs to be community based with the areas of support to be determined
by the people themselves, not necessarily directed through the Forestry
Department. While the ICDS programme is more centrally determined, the
success of inducing a behavioral change in the future would fare better if
implemented through the active participation of the community at the local
levels. Decentralised management
(including the participatory process) of the ICDS programme would include not
only the adoption of greater responsibility by the states but also at the
local village levels. Thus, for instance, if the Anganwadi Workers (as
well as the Auxiliary Nurse Midwife) are accountable to the local communities
through having their stipends and salaries paid through the village
Panchayats, the community interest in effective scheme performance is likely
to be improved. Alternatively, villages could provide contributions in the
form of adding food components that make the blended foods more attractive. They
could even pay for a second Anganwadi Worker from their own resources
so that greater attention could be given to children below three years of age
as well as pregnant women at risk. Establishing
participation of the communities could be channeled through the existing
structure of representative decentralised Government, the Panchayati Raj – at
the village, block and district levels. Implementing programmes through this
structure would have a mutually reinforcing role: it would improve programme
implementation as well as strengthen the decentralisation objective of
Government. To the credit of the current ICP, recognition of the importance
of and prospects for adopting such an approach is evident in the attempts
made in the district of Jhabua in Madhya Pradesh. A decentralised approach
should include the District Rural Development Agency (of the Department of
Rural development). DRDA’s responsibility is the implementation and
management of anti-poverty programmes of the Department of Rural Development
while exercising a critical coordinating role in poverty alleviation for all
programmes at the district level. There will therefore be a need to establish
operational relationships with other line agencies of the Government in the
future. Impact and Sustainability:
activity mix and exit strategies There are two dimensions
of the future Country Programme that must remain a major aspect of all future
interventions: they must demonstrate genuine change and document measurable
impact. Measurable impact also translates into a requirement that the interventions
must be time-bound and consequently have some form of an exit
strategy. In the context of interventions in the social, women and
children sectors, effective impact should focus not as much on the actual
support provided by the interventions with food (or fortified food) but on
linkages with other non-food based inputs such as literacy, health and
training. The question of exit strategy will have to be seen from the
perspective of asset creation for the target group so as to be able to
commensurate for the services provided. In the context of a
physical infrastructure based programme that lends itself to food for work,
the choice of activities to be supported will determine sustainability and
the elements of an exit strategy. The creation of an asset could be one that
is directly productive as in the case of a micro dam or ‘anicut’ construction
or one that would belong to the category of a public good or a common
property resource, such as a road or forest reserve. In any case, what is to
be assured is that the beneficiaries during the process of construction of
the asset also remain the beneficiaries in its utilisation after its
completion. In other words, if definition of an exit strategy is to play a
role in the choice of activities, then efforts need to be directed, as much
as possible, to the creation of productive assets, unless the common property
resource, such as a forest, is able to provide sustainable benefits to the
community. Partnerships If it is to achieve its
role as a catalyst, leveraging policy and resources, WFP will need to forge
appropriate partnerships with a range of agencies, government departments,
donors, NGOs and civil society. Given the limited nature of the support that
it can provide, basically only food, programme impact will be critically
dependent on forming appropriate linkages with other agencies that can
provide the critical non-food inputs. The importance of such association
linking the provision of food with health, literacy, education and training
has been acknowledged in the current ICDS programme, but more can be done to
ensure that nutrition is not seen as only a food problem. Similarly, while
the provision of food for work provides one element in the construction of an
asset, it is critically dependent on financial resources for all other
elements that go towards the creation of the asset. For this, partnerships
are critical. One area where
prospective partnerships could be very rewarding is with bi-lateral donors,
such as DFID, GTZ, JICA, USAID, sister UN Agencies and civil society.
Discussions reveal a surprising communality of development objectives and
interest in collaboration. While the mission is under no illusion that such
partnerships are easy, it is also aware that such expressions of interest in
partnership are also rare. Given the prospective benefits that could be
generated, it is imperative to pursue the possibility of such partnerships.
An indication of the pursuit of such an approach is the development of a joint
project with IFAD for the rehabilitation of the cyclone-affected areas in
Orissa. WFP support would be provided for a food based physical
infrastructure construction programme with IFAD support being provided for
cash, training and community mobilisation. Similarly, partnership with UNICEF
towards a more expanded use of fortified nutrient supplementation as well as
with World Bank, CARE and USAID in establishing a generally accepted
nutrition agenda reflect possibilities for the future. A further aspect of
partnership is the collaboration with other UN agencies under the UNDAF
framework and harmonization of the programme cycle. As per GA Resolution
47/1999, WFP (India) has agreed to harmonize its programme cycle with those
of other UN agencies, implying that the new Country Programme would start in
January 2003. The on-going Country Programme will therefore require a
nine-month extension with a budget revision that will be presented to the
Executive Board at the same time as the new Country Strategy Outline. While a
few collaborations (for e.g. ILO) have taken place with other UN agencies
involved in the UNDAF process, local representatives have agreed to focus
their activities on two themes: decentralisation of development and gender
equality. These are in line with current Government policies and will
constitute the basis for WFP’s new Country Strategy Outline. Disaster
Responsiveness In the case of random
disasters, the role of WFP will remain that of supporting rehabilitation. It
is an important role and one where WFP has shown time and again its ability
to respond quickly and effectively, as for instance, in the case of the
recent Orissa cyclone and floods. There can be little argument for
maintaining stocks for such situations given the costs involved and, in
India’s case, given the large reserves it carries. It is the recurring theme
of disasters and its impact on the poor where the rationale for WFP’s food
aid for development can play a critical role. For areas with a susceptibility
to recurring disasters, floods or droughts, the most effective method is by
making the recurring incidence of such disasters a factor in the assessment
of the vulnerability of the area and its population and therefore an area for
WFP operation. Such has been the case in the selection of areas in much of
the tribal development programme where recurring droughts have had a major
impact. This however leaves the possibility for selecting other areas in the
future, such as in Assam where there is a recurring incidence of floods. Management Information
System (MIS) and Results Based Management (RBM) Effective implementation
of the future programme will be significantly dependent on an effective MIS
unit in the Country Office. In an environment where resource use will be
under intense scrutiny in the future, it becomes imperative that adequate
staff and resources be provided to maintain a continuous monitoring of the
programme. The recent move towards an RBM approach implies the necessity also
for developing appropriate and relevant parameters to measure outputs and
outcomes relevant to the objectives of the interventions. Future Programme Strategy The specific elements
constituting what should form the Country Programme can only be determined by
the Country Office in close collaboration with the Government. The
mission nevertheless is proposing a programme strategy on which a future
Country Programme can be designed. This has been largely based on the
experience of the current programmes and the rationale for their continuation
and/or modifications into the future. The future programme
strategy for India should have two principal dimensions. The first covers
the specific dimension of WFP’s own food assisted development programme.
This, in turn, would have two objectives. The first would aim at specifically
improving the dire nutritional status of children and women in India.
It would focus on improved nutrition and health for women and children
through improvements and expansion of the current ICDS programme 14 . The second would aim at
supporting improvements in the productive or social capacities of families
through actions that increase incomes, food consumption, education and asset
generation in the community as a whole, and women in particular – an
effective economic empowerment of women. Assistance to children and
women would be the entry points to improved nutrition and household food
security. Thus food assistance would aim at women’s health and nutritional
status, levels of literacy, education and skills for improving their
participation in economic activities and participation in decision making.
However what is critical is, along with support on the nutrition and health
front, efforts be directed towards economic empowerment. The creation of a
lasting asset would be the appropriate way. This could include directly
productive support as in forestry activities through JFM or the provision of
micro-dams or other water impoundments or could extend to the provision of
drinking water or schools etc. The strategy would be to aim at a convergence
of the current programmes into one people-focused, area-based approach.
This approach would implicitly address the disaster mitigation strategy
through the selection of the specific areas that are vulnerable to natural
disasters. It would also allow the piloting of new interventions within the
overall objectives. The implications of this strategy would have a bearing on
the overall operational modality of WFP’s operations, not the least of which
would be an organisational change for the country office itself. The second dimension of the programme strategy would
be the adoption of an explicit advocacy role to induce appropriate
policies and resources to directly address the gender dimension of nutrition
in India in particular as well as that of providing greater food security and
poverty alleviation for the poor and the hungry. There are a number of levels
at which this advocacy role should be aimed at. WFP will have to build its
capacity for carrying the debate on hunger, food insecurity and female
discrimination to the highest levels of policy-making, media scrutiny, and
academic attention within the country. There are a number of examples of
current and upcoming fora where WFP could play a crucial role. However, they
should start from elements that have a direct bearing on the current
programmes. More importantly however,
WFP’s advocacy role to policy questions in existing programmes becomes most
critical, such as, in making ICDS policy more flexible with regard to
state-specific conditions and needs, and expanding coverage into remote, less
densely-populated regions that cannot meet AWC threshold conditions. In
addition, it could extend to providing other donor agencies information on
the major incidence of hunger and malnutrition through, for instance, the
creation of a food insecurity/hunger map, and joining or inducing other
agencies to operate in the same areas so as to create a synergy in the fight
against hunger. Advocacy should not only
involve a flow of information to national authorities or laterally to other
agencies. Enabling the dissemination of best practices across state
boundaries would be a useful advocacy role (through training or workshop
meetings of District Collector-level functionaries). Importantly, WFP might
also play a useful role in initiating information flows ‘downwards’ to the
Panchayati Raj Institutions and village communities where future WFP
programnmes are likely to operate. This also implies going beyond the role of
the traditional information broker by facilitating enhanced knowledge of loan
and grant opportunities from central line ministries (such as the many funds
available from the Department of Women and Child Development (DWCD), and the
District Rural Development Authorities (DRDA). Channelling information about
practical entitlements such as changes in ration eligibility through TPDS,
could be a valuable new component of training through Anganwadi Centres
(AWCs) and/or periodic health camps in remote villages 15 . Village level information empowerment
should be an integral part of any strategy aimed at amplifying the effective
demand of villages for services that they have not received. But advocacy is not only
about engaging in public discussion. As noted by the Strategic and Financial
Plan (1998-2001), advocacy requires more effort to persuade national and
state authorities to prioritise their own resources for action against the
worst problems. It would aim to focus more attention on the remote regions
and marginalised people, and to energise co-ordination mechanisms across
agencies and sectoral lines that can continue to operate even once WFP has
moved on. Engaging all stakeholders is important is getting a message
sustained. Implications
for WFP India The suggested future
strategy for India has implications for WFP’s operational methods. These
include:
Managing the
transition The aim of the remaining
period of the current programme can be viewed as one of transition. During
this period the focus of activities will be two-pronged: attempts would be
made to undertake a revision of the present activities for greater impact;
and, efforts would aim to experiment with alternative approaches and
institutional modalities for easier future adoption. These activities, in
turn, can be viewed in four dimensions. The first would initiate the process
of dialogue and advocacy for focusing attention on the poor and the hungry,
and create a better appreciation and rationale for WFP operations. The second
would adopt a measured rationalising of its operations between the different
states in the interest of efficiency and greater impact. This would also
extend to ensuring that government budgetary resources remain stable despite
changes in operational areas. The third would be to establish the programme
in pilot districts, demonstrating the new modalities of the future. The fourth
would undertake the re-organisation of the WFP Country Office to better
reflect the structure of the future programme. Initiate process of
advocacy and dialogue. WFP should organise seminars and workshops with a variety
of agencies at the national, state and district levels to leverage a greater
focus on the poor and hungry. Part of the focus would be on policy and the
creation of an environment that places the eradication of hunger as a primary
goal for development. This would extend to the generation of information on
the locus of the major hunger problem in the country. Part of the focus
should also be to induce an increased resource flow in hunger eradication, as
for instance, inducing the Government to match WFP’s own resource commitment
with an equivalent amount of food in addition to its current obligations 16 . Efforts should be undertaken for
greater government interaction through these dialogues and workshops. Rationalise WFP’s
operational areas. Although current operations nominally cover eight states, actual
implementation is concentrated in four out of the eight states. It may be
appropriate to look at vulnerability of the people and also establish
‘performance benchmarks’ so as to facilitate the decision to withdraw from
the non-performing states. Furthermore, WFP should aim at a greater overlap
of the two programmes in the same districts of those states. It is not
necessary to cover all districts in the states. However, for the districts
covered, an effort should be made to deepen the coverage by both programmes.
Deepening the coverage is likely to require increased budgetary resources.
Consequently, it would be imperative for WFP to engage Central and State
Governments in a dialogue to increase budgetary allocations without which
increased coverage in the states will not be possible. Pilot exercise of
future modalities. An integrated food aided development exercise that is not dependent on
the current two line agencies should be attempted in at least one district in
each state. This exercise should be district based and essentially replicates
a combined Jhabua, Banswara model. The exercise should aim at demonstrating
the integration of the ICDS programme with a generalised poverty
alleviation/"rural development" effort coordinated through the
district/village based Panchayats structure. The objective would be to engage
the government in a dialogue eventually leading to amendments to the basic
agreement. Internal
reorganisation of the Country Office. The two-dimensional organisational structure of the
country office needs to be modified to reflect one area-based structure. This
would allow for synergies among the different elements that would constitute
the development programme. The following is a proposal for consideration by
the country office. At the national country office level there should be one
unit for coordinating activities. This should be supplemented by a sub-office
at each state level that would be responsible for actual hands-on management
of the programme. Thus, each state level unit would be responsible for all
programmes within the state. At the level of the country office there should
also be a strong VAM/MIS unit to facilitate and improve targeting and a small
advocacy unit to ensure that the role of WFP and of food aid is appropriately
reflected through the holding of seminars, workshops and commissioning
specific studies. Appendix
*
including the expansion due to the Orissa cyclone of October 1999 * 1) including the expansion: for the
Orissa expansion only 4,206 out of 42,070 tons had been resourced until
16.12.99; i.e. in total only 137,976 tons **
excluding the Orissa expansion **2)
excluding the expansion: out of the total only 93,000 tons (i.e. 70%) were
utilized. Note: Beneficiary
calculation for Forestry in Tribal Areas project: number of workers
multiplied by five household members. Annex 1 - Strategic Implications
of the FAAD policy for WFP strategy in India Annex 2 - WFP
Assistance to the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS)
Programme Annex 2: Appendix 1 - Monitoring and Evaluation Annex 2: Appendix
2 - Indiamix Promotion References 1. Evaluation Mission Members: Mr. Iqbal Sobhan, Mission Leader
(FAO Investment Centre), Ms. Christa Rader, Programme
Coordinator (WFP Headquarters), Mr. Patrick Webb, Food Security
Expert (Consultant) Ms. Neena Dodd, Gender Specialist
(Consultant) and Mr. T. Schaetzel, Monitoring and
Evaluation Specialist (Consultant). 2. Entitled "Enabling
Development", it was approved by the WFP Executive Board in May
1999. 3. Operational since 1975, the ICDS programme of
the Government is designed to provide integrated services including basic
health, nutrition and education to poor women and children through village
level Anganwadi centres (AWCs). The central and state Governments jointly
sponsor the programme and the current infrastructure extends to about 500,000
AWCs serving about 23.9 million women and children. 4. Nutritional supplementation effects depend on
the degree to which food provided at the AWC is consumed in addition to
normal household diets. However, regardless of whether there is any
substitution, WFP fortified food has a supplementary effect because it is of
a higher nutrient density. 7.
ACC/SCN (Administrative Co-ordinating Committee/Sub-Committee on Nutrition),
1998. Nutrition and Poverty. Papers from ACC/SCN 24th
Session Symposium, Kathmandu March 1997. Geneva: WHO/ ACC/SCN.
12.
Dreze, J. and A. Sen 1995. India Economic Development and Social
Opportunity, Delhi. Oxford University Press. 13.
Datt, G 1998. Poverty in India and Indian States: An Update Discussion
Paper 47. Washington D.C., IFPRI. 14.
See Annex 2 for detailed suggestions on improvements to the ICDS
programme. 15.
The idea of promoting Household Entitlement Cards has already been promoted in
Tamil Nadu and elsewhere in India, based on the idea that communities are entitled
to know much more about the programmes, procedures and benefits available in
their own districts and from central government (Swaminathan 1997). The
National Human Rights Commission has also requested the government in Orissa
to publish and circulate information on the relief ‘entitlements’ that
cyclone affected communities should expect and demand. Thus the entitlement
card idea is applicable to both development and emergency activities. 16.
Initial discussions with several line ministries both at the State and National level
indicate a willingness to consider such a proposition.
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World Food Programme 2, Poorvi Marg, Vasant Vihar, New Delhi – 110057, India Tel:91-11-26150000-04, Fax:91-11-26150019
Contact:
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