Coalition Approach to Food and Livelihood Security in Ethiopia

1
Coalition Approach to Food and Livelihood
Security in Ethiopia

• Getachew Asamenew
• Assistant Resident Representative, UNDP,
  Ethiopia
  
• 2nd African Drought Risk and Development Forum,
  16-18 Oct 2006, Nairobi
  

2
The Challenge

• Food insecurity and transition from emergency to
  early recovery impacting development
  
• Vulnerability and drought disaster risk together
  with structural factors causes
  
• Frequent droughts affect millions of people
• Addressing chronic, predictable and underlying
  structural challenges in parallel with
  humanitarian response
  
• How to deal with short-term food security problem
  while working on longer-term growth agenda

3
In Response

• Government has been pursuing actions
• Putting in place new policies, strategies and
  arrangements for lasting solution
  
• Food security and related development strategies
• Continued challenge called for strengthening
  existing approach
  
• Particularly in response to the 2003 drought that
  affected 13.2 million people
  
• Called for a series of policy dialogue

4
In Response

• Need for doing business differently
• The Coalition for food security set up
• A major positive step in mobilizing commitment
  of the government and development partners
  
• Active involvement of leaders in government and
  non-government agencies made the Coalition
  approach special
  
• A variety of partners were brought together the
  government (federal regional), donors, civil
  society, etc..
  

5
The Coalition ideas

• Agreed to an ambitious plan to bring a major turn
  around in food security
  
• Address the 5 million people chronically affected
  and additional 10 million vulnerable groups faced
  with acute food insecurity
  

6
The Coalition approach

• Mobilization of political will/commitment from
  all
  
• Fostering greater coordination and harmonization
  actions
  
• Accelerated capacity development
• Addressing the food security and livelihood
  challenge in an emergency mode with sense of
  urgency
  
• Development of an ambitious national food
  security and sustainable livelihood programme

7
The Coalition approach

• Inclusive partnership
• Social mobilization for promoting self reliance
  involving the people themselves
  
• Up scaling of best practices
• Expanded market orientation

8
The Process

• Continued engagement of the leadership in
  government and development partners in
  consultation
  
• Setting up of a Technical Group made-up of
  representatives of the government and development
  partners
  
• Ministry of Agriculture
• Disaster Prevention and Preparedness Agency
• Ministry of Water Resources
• Ministry of Finance and Economic Development
• Ministry of Rural Development
• Ministry of Health
• Ministry of Federal Affaires

9
The Process

• Representatives from the Regional States
• Development partners UNDP, USAID, WB, FAO, WFP,
  USAID, CIDA, SIDA, Ireland, Germany, Japan,
  Italy, NGOs (CRDA, OXFAM- UK)
  
• The Technical Group developed an ambitious
  national programme
  
• Worked over six months from common premises

10
Progress

• Mobilization of commitments of both the
  government and partners
  
• Restructuring of the food security institutions
• The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development
  merged as one giant ministry Ministry of
  Agriculture and Rural Development
  
• Food Security Coordination Bureau established
• Various at the regional level merged to the
  Bureau of Food Security, Disaster Prevention and
  Preparedness
  

11
Progress

• Implementation of the productive safety net
  programme to reach millions of the food insecure
  all over the country
  
• Implementation of the voluntary resettlement
  programme (planned to move 2.2 million people)
  
• Social mobilization strategy and manual ready for
  large scale implementation allover the country

12
Progress

• Strengthening the Coalition approach
• Annual festival planned for early this December,
  - will take in one the regional capital, -
  revolve between region annually
  
• The first of its kind in the country designed
  for popularizing and up scaling best practices
  
• The Second United Nations development framework
  to contribute partnership among UN agencies, the
  government and development partners
  

13
Progress

• Joint programme to enhance the linkages between
  humanitarian response, recovery and food
  security
  
• The CPAPs will feed into this
• Accelerated capacity development is a central
  element to augment the coordination mechanism/
  the coalition approach at federal and regional
  levels
• Greater advocacy for strategies/policies to
  strengthen the link between emergencies, early
  recovery and sustainable development
  

14
In Conclusion

• A Coalition approach can be effective with
  continued political commitment from all
  
• Readiness of development partners for greater
  coordination and harmonization
  
• Continued active involvement in the process is
  necessary
  
• Ethiopias Coalition approach is a good example
• Institutionalization of the Approach with
  enhanced national ownership
  
• An innovative way to prepare ground for
  addressing the Hunger MDG