Executive Board Third Regular Session Rome, 22–26 October 2001 EE Distribution: GENERAL 5 September 2001 ORIGINAL: ENGLISH This document is printed in a limited number of copies. Executive Board documents are available on WFP’s WEB site (http://www.wfp.org/eb). 2 WFP/EB.3/2001/8/4 Note to the Executive Board This document is submitted for approval to the Executive Board. The Secretariat invites members of the Board who may have questions of a technical nature with regard to this document to contact the WFP staff focal points indicated below, preferably well in advance of the Board's meeting. Director, Mediterranean, Middle East and Central Asia Mr K. Adly Regional Bureau (ODC): Liaison Officer, ODC: Ms D. Owen tel.: 066513-2800 Should you have any questions regarding matters of dispatch of documentation for the Executive Board, please contact the Supervisor, Meeting Servicing and Distribution Unit (tel.: 066513-2328). WFP/EB.3/2001/8/4 3 Executive Summary The rationale, and the elements of the strategy, for providing WFP food assistance to Egypt were presented in the Egypt Country Strategy Outline (CSO), which was endorsed by the Executive Board at its Third Regular Session in October 2000. (Its Executive Summary is attached as Annex I.) Since then, there have been no significant changes in the country’s food security, poverty levels and other socio-economic indicators. The proposed Egypt Country Programme (CP) is in line with the CSO and elaborates the programme of activities planned for the five-year period 2002–2006. The CP follows the Enabling Development policy framework and is consistent with the food security enhancement and poverty-reduction goals of global United Nations conferences (World Food Summit; World Summit for Social Development) and WFP’s Commitments to Women at Beijing. It also incorporates the key recommendations of the evaluation of the previous CP. A comprehensive process of vulnerability analysis and mapping (VAM) conducted by the regional unit helped improve targeting to those most in need of assistance on a geographic basis. This process included collaboration with the technical groups associated with the Egypt Common Country Assessment (CCA) and United Nations Development Assistance Framework (UNDAF). Accordingly, the primary focus for providing assistance will be on the highly food insecure landless people and on primary school–age children in the poorest areas of Upper Egypt region. In addition, the marginalized communities living in desert areas on the Sinai Peninsula and in the Red Sea Governorate will also receive assistance. These targeted geographic areas and people, and the planned WFP food-assistance activities, are consistent with the Government’s development policy and strategy. The CP will continue, and strengthen, the previous CP’s highly successful interventions aimed at the empowerment of women (assuring a share of land; issuing identity cards) by increasing the number of women who directly benefit. A study undertaken during the previous CP on participatory processes and gender-related actions in the field will foster an adoption of a programme-wide approach to the participation and empowerment of women. WFP’s active participation in the CCA/UNDAF process, including chairing the Food Security and Nutrition Thematic Group, has focused attention on food insecurity and hunger issues, and the areas where they are most serious. In particular, the CP aims to collaborate with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) to provide complementary activities in WFP activity areas, such as those involving micro-credit, agricultural technical assistance, improving the health and nutrition of children and women, training women to generate income and improving women’s literacy. In accordance with decision 1999/EB.A/2 of the Executive Board, WFP focuses its development activities on five objectives. This CP addresses objectives 2, 3 and 5: 4 WFP/EB.3/2001/8/4 Enable poor households to invest in human capital through education and training (Supplementary Activity); Make it possible for poor families to gain and preserve assets (Basic Activity 1); Enable households that depend on degraded natural resources for their food security to make a shift to more sustainable livelihoods (Basic Activity 2). For the proposed Egypt Country Programme covering the period 2002–2006, the Executive Director requests the Executive Board to approve, subject to availability of resources, US$34,365,462 representing all basic direct operational costs, and to endorse US$10,069,261 for supplementary activities. Draft Decision The Board approves the Country Programme for Egypt (2002–2006) (WFP/EB.3/2001/8/4). WFP/EB.3/2001/8/4 5 STRATEGIC FOCUS OF THE WFP COUNTRY PROGRAMME 1. Egypt, a low-income, food-deficit country (LIFDC), imports nearly 50 percent of grain requirements annually to help feed a population of more than 64 million people. Nearly the entire population lives on less than 4 percent of the land, placing enormous pressure on limited natural resources and the environment. Notwithstanding a food supply policy that has adequately met market demand, there is a sizeable segment of the population facing the serious problem of food insecurity and its consequences. About 12 percent of the population, approximately 7.7 million people, consume less than 2,100 kcal per day. Since consumption levels required for people to lead healthy and productive lives are normally much higher, a much larger proportion of the Egyptian population should be facing food insecurity. Estimates of poverty (based on expenditure for food consumption) shed more light on this problem. Recent studies indicate that about 23 percent of the population (13.6 million people) are living below the poverty line. Paradoxically, this level of poverty exists alongside an impressive macroeconomic performance in the recent past. However, insufficient food consumption, compounded by poor hygiene, illness, disease prevalence and inappropriate dietary habits, has brought about a significant level of malnutrition among children: One in five children under 5 is severely or moderately stunted and nearly 11 percent are underweight. 2. Food insecurity and poverty as well as gender disparities have sectoral and regional dimensions. In the worst-off governorates in Upper Egypt nearly 15 percent of the households in the rural sector fall below the 2,100-kcal intake level. There is also a relatively higher incidence of stunting (24.9 percent), underweight (14.2 percent) and wasting (8.1 percent) in Upper Egypt. The incidence of poverty is 34 percent in Upper Egypt compared with about 17 percent in Lower Egypt. In the rural sector, 36 percent of households headed by women are in poverty, compared with 28 percent for those headed by men. The literacy rate in the rural sector is 44 percent (70 percent in the urban sector), with the female literacy rate at just 29 percent (62 percent in the urban sector). Although there has been significant progress in primary school enrolment and gender ratios, several governorates in Upper Egypt and desert areas with Bedouin populations show enrolment rates much lower than the national averages. 3. The goal of the Egypt Country Programme 2002–2006 is to help reduce malnutrition and poverty and enhance the human resources in the target areas of Upper Egypt and desert areas. This would be achieved through the creation of physical assets to enable self-reliant food security and increased income, with emphasis placed on participatory community development and the socio-economic empowerment of women. This goal is consistent with the development policy goals of the Government of Egypt and the development objectives of the United Nations system. The CP is formulated within the framework of the Enabling Development policy approved by the Executive Board and is based on the Egypt Country Strategy Outline endorsed by the Executive Board at its Third Regular Session in October 2000 (See Annex I). It also takes into account the recommendations of the mid-term evaluation of the previous CP. 4. The strategic focus of this CP is on households that are likely to be most food insecure but that have self-reliant development opportunities, which they are able to make effective use of, if incentives are provided. The CP is based on the well-identified premise that food assistance can play a unique role in helping increase self-reliance. Beneficiaries will come from landless households, marginalized Bedouin communities and poor families with primary school–age. Geographic targeting, which was undertaken in accordance with the 6 WFP/EB.3/2001/8/4 Enabling Development policy, resulted in a sharpening of focus primarily on Upper Egypt. This is the result of a comprehensive VAM analysis undertaken by the regional VAM unit in collaboration with the country office and the technical groups associated with the preparation of the Egypt CCA and UNDAF. The main targeted governorates in Upper Egypt are: Asuit, Aswan, Beni Suef, Fayoum, Menia and Sohag. The CP also focuses on desert areas in Sinai and the Red Sea Governorate, where the primary focus will be on Bedouin communities, which are struggling to eke out a living under harsh desert conditions. 5. The development opportunities come from three types of government-sponsored programmes. These are: (i) agricultural settlement schemes in Upper Egypt (using Nile waters) and the Red Sea Governorate (using underground water resources); (ii) sedentarization of Bedouin livelihoods through settled agriculture and community development; and (iii) a free primary education system. Providing irrigated agricultural settlements is a major form of implementing government policy for increased domestic agricultural output and sustainable incomes for the poor. In the desert areas, an already fragile ecosystem cannot sustain the traditional nomadic livelihoods of the Bedouins; hence assistance is provided to encourage Beduouins to engage in settled and diversified livelihoods that are less damaging to the environment.