DIFFERENT MANDATES ... A COMMON VISION

FAO was founded in 1945 with a mandate to raise nutritional levels and living standards, to improve agricultural productivity and to better the condition of rural people. FAO is the lead agency for technical expertise in food security, agriculture, forestry, fisheries and rural development, as well as in the sustainable management of natural resources essential over the long term.

IFAD was established in 1977 to assist developing countries to combat rural poverty by mobilizing and providing financial resources on concessional terms for agricultural and rural development projects. Its mandate is unique among international financial institutions: to fund rural development projects that will improve the nutritional level and living conditions of the poorest populations in developing countries.

WFP, the food aid agency of the United Nations system, was created in 1963. It provides food aid to save lives in emergency situations, to improve the nutrition and quality of life of the most vulnerable people at critical times in their lives, to help build infrastructural assets and to promote the self-reliance of poor people and communities.

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OUR PLEDGE

This issue of Working together is timed to coincide with the World Food Summit: five years later, or WFS:fyl. In November this year, government leaders and representatives of many institutions concerned with the eradication of hunger and poverty are expected to reaffirm their commitment, made here in Rome in 1996, to cut the number of undernourished people in the world by half, by the year 2015.

From left to right:
Catherine A.Bertini, Executive Director, WFP; Jacques Diouf, Director-General, FAO; Lennart Båge, President, IFAD

For us, as heads of the three Rome-based food agencies, WFS:fyl is the occasion to reaffirm our commitment to working together in ways that make the most of our complementary mandates, skills and experience. We pledge to redouble our efforts to ensure that, as our member countries strive to meet the Summit goal, they can be confident of the strongest possible support from their partners in Rome.

This and earlier issues of Working together portray the many ways in which our agencies collaborate in the pursuit of common goals. This joint publication reflects our shared conviction that a world without hunger is within our grasp and that we have a central role to play in its creation. This is particularly so because hunger and poverty bite deepest in the rural areas of developing countries, where our work is mainly focused.

In working together to eradicate hunger, we share a number of fundamental beliefs that guide our joint actions:

• We believe that, in spite of initially slow progress, it is still possible to achieve the WFS target by 2015.
• We subscribe to the principles of the "Right to food" endorsed by UN member states and seek to take them into account in designing the programmes and activities of our institutions.
• We see hunger largely as a problem created by people, but also solvable by people. Most of the solutions are well understood and can be implemented in every country, provided there is sufficient political will on the part of all concerned.
• We see hunger as both a cause and an effect of deep poverty: we believe that unless both hunger and poverty are banished, we cannot lay strong foundations for sustainable and broad-based economic development.
• We believe that action to counter hunger must also reach down to the household level and should focus on engaging women who bear the major responsibility for family food security.
• We believe that eradicating hunger is a moral imperative, and we are also convinced that it will generate important economic benefits at national and global levels.
• We are deeply concerned that, if we do not make rapid progress towards eradicating hunger, global political and economic stability will be threatened, together with the sustainable use of the natural resources on which future world food supplies depend.
• We believe that solutions to the hunger problem are readily affordable.
• We deplore the lack of resources committed to reducing food insecurity and other manifestations of poverty, and the widening gap between rich and poor within and between nations.
  

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FORGING PARTNERSHIPS FOR FOOD SECURITY

A network set up specifically to promote coordination among UN agencies is strengthening interagency partnerships in the fight to alleviate poverty and hunger in the world. The Administrative Committee on Coordination (ACC) Network was set up in 1997 and is managed by FAO and IFAD, in close collaboration with WFP. It acts as a follow-up mechanism for the World Food Summit Plan of Action, which called for coordinated and focused action by development partners at the country level to secure "food for all".

As of August 2001, at the international level, the ACC Network consists of 20 UN organizations and associated international and regional non-governmental organizations (NGOs); and at the country level, of 69 national Thematic Groups working on rural development and food security in Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean, and the Near East.

The national Thematic Group is integral to the ACC Network. Typically composed of representatives of UN agencies and organizations in the country, government agencies, donors and civil society organizations, the Thematic Group aims to respond in a demand-driven and participatory way to country-specific needs and priorities. It provides a coherent framework for initiating collective action and mobilizing funds for rural development and food security activities. These range from the development of national food security strategies, country nutrition profiles, participatory needs assessments and information systems, to the design and implementation of rural development programmes.

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FAO AND WFP JOIN FORCES IN KOSOVO

In the emergency phase immediately following the events of 1999 in Kosovo, FAO and WFP set up a joint unit that has been key to the coordination of their efforts, and those of other agencies, international organizations and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), to help the Kosovars recover from the conflict.

The FAO/WFP Food Security Surveillance Unit (FSSU) was funded by the Government of the United States and started work in January 2000. It was set up to establish and monitor thresholds for interventions and designed in accordance with the programmes of the two agencies in Kosovo. It has forged strong links with all the major agencies operating in the area and participated in most initiatives relating to food security and emergency agricultural assistance.

The Unit is staffed by a project manager from FAO, a vulnerability analysis officer from WFP and two national officers in Pristina.

Food security surveillance is multifaceted; accordingly, the Unit performs several roles. In collaboration with the United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) Department of Agriculture, it monitors the agricultural season in Kosovo's 30 municipalities. The officer in charge of this activity makes regular trips to the municipalities, talking to farmers and visiting the fields to check the data collected. Together with the UNMIK Department of Agriculture, the Unit has prepared the pre-harvest FAO/WFP Crop and Food Supply Assessment for Kosovo in order to estimate needs for agricultural relief.

The FSSU also coordinates the collection and analysis of data relating to retail and market prices for a commodity basket with 45 products, both food and non-food. This price monitoring system was started in June 2000 and is currently used by the UNMIK Central Fiscal Authority to calculate a Consumer Price Index. The Unit supervises the data collectors, updates the database and analyses the average prices, as well as producing a monthly bulletin distributed to all partners involved in humanitarian assistance in Kosovo.

The Unit has coordinated the major food needs assessments undertaken in 2000/2001, looking at the food security of the minority enclaves in Kosovo and working on the February 2001 WFP Food Needs Assessment for the revision of the food aid strategy.

The Unit has participated in the World Bank Living Standards Measurement Survey and in the joint Inter-Agency Poverty Assessment, both undertaken in Kosovo in the second half of 2000.

The FSSU has also revised monitoring procedures and databases developed by FAO and WFP and provided all the geographic information system (GIS) materials requested by the programmes in Kosovo.

The first phase of the project ended in April 2001. A second phase has been covered by several donors and will enable an expansion of the Unit's work in terms of both its activities and geographical coverage. In the summer of 2001, work started in Serbia with a national officer under the supervision of the project manager.

When necessary, the Unit will also assist agencies involved in ad hoc vulnerability and food security assessments in neighbouring countries such as Albania and The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. Work in Kosovo will continue throughout the second phase of the project.

In Kosovo, the second phase of the project will focus on handing over materials and procedures - agricultural monitoring procedures, the food security GIS, the price monitoring system and the remote-sensing procedures for seasonal agricultural monitoring -to the relevant local authorities.

To ensure continuity in its vital work, the FSSU will also carry on its work with leading agencies, developing tools for the assessment and targeting of vulnerable populations in future humanitarian and development programmes in Kosovo and Serbia.

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PROMOTING CASSAVA TECHNOLOGIES FOR GREATER FOOD SECURITY

In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, FAO and WFP are working together within the framework of an ACC Network-affiliated group - the Consultative Group on Cassava - to ensure sustainable production of the root crop. Cassava is a staple food for 70 percent of the population but in recent years there has been a significant decline in yields in the country (from 19.4 million tonnes in 1995 to 15.9 million tonnes in 2000), leading to widespread reports of food insecurity.

In December 2000, the Consultative Group on Cassava organized a visit by a group of scientists from Nigeria to help identify the causes of the shrinking cassava harvests. The multidisciplinary team of scientists, from the International Institute for Tropical Agriculture (IITA), made field trips to the Kinshasa and Bas Congo provinces, where they found that pests and diseases, including cassava mosaic virus, were the major causes of the decrease in production.

The Group coordinated a series of meetings with representatives of the government, the international community and the private sector, and presented immediate and medium-term measures for action.

As a result of the initiative, a multidonor project is being formulated: "Accelerated generation and deployment of cassava technologies for enhanced and sustainable food availability and poverty alleviation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo". With an estimated budget of about US$5 million for five years, the project will cover the 11 provinces of the country.

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GUIDANCE ON HOUSEHOLD FOOD SECURITY

FAO, IFAD and WFP finalized a Guidance note on household food security and nutrition in a concerted effort to promote common understanding of food security issues both within the UN system and beyond. The note is intended for field offices and identifies multisectoral approaches to improving food security and reducing malnutrition.

The note was presented at the Special Session of the Economic and Social Council on Eliminating Hunger in the New Millennium. There, the heads of the three Rome-based agencies briefed the Council on activities to improve food security worldwide, stressing the need for all UN agencies to work jointly.

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FARMER FIELD SCHOOLS

With a grant from IFAD, FAO is implementing a pilot project for farmer field schools in Kenya, Uganda and the United Republic of Tanzania. Farmer field schools use participatory hands-on learning techniques and have been operating for many years in Asia, where they were originally designed for the promotion of integrated pest management.

The techniques of participatory discovery learning applied by the schools raise farmers' understanding of the basic scientific processes taking place in the fields. As they learn more about what determines farm performance, and about technical and management options for improving this, small and marginalized farmers are empowered. Their empowerment is a vital strand in the effort to reduce food insecurity and enhance sustainable land use.

The schools are proving an effective alternative approach to agricultural extension and the approach is currently being incorporated in IFAD's new projects in Tanzania and Uganda.

The overall objective of the FAO/IFAD project is to expand the capacity of governments, non-governmental organizations and the private sector to respond to farmers' needs for knowledge and information that will enable them to upgrade their farming systems.

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STRENGTHENING NATIONAL CAPACITIES IN AGRICULTURAL TRAINING

The Administrative Committee on Coordination (ACC) Network Thematic Group in the Gambia is working to promote collaboration among the country's four agricultural training centres. Each centre focuses on a particular area of expertise - agriculture, agroforestry, livestock and rural development - and promoting the links between them is vital to improving national competence in agricultural training.

The Thematic Group - made up of representatives from the UN system (FAO, the United Nations Children's Fund [UNICEF], the United Nations Development Programme [UNDP] and WFP), the government, civil society and donors - started work with the agricultural training centres by organizing a field trip to each of them. This helped in determining the centres' current status and activities, identifying constraints faced by staff and establishing a mechanism for supporting training activities in a coordinated manner.

As a follow-up to the field trip, the Group brought together staff from the training centres at a Consultative Forum held at Jenoi Training Centre in February 2001. After the Forum a work and cooperation plan was drafted. The plan calls for the establishment of a network (the Gambia Agricultural Training Centres Network); the sharing of annual work plans; the creation of a databank of resource persons in the centres; the publication of a newsletter and the production of radio programmes drawing on contributions from all the agricultural centres in the country. The Group is now preparing a list of potential donors to support the continued development of agricultural training centres in the Gambia.

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BOOSTING THE PRODUCTION OF CASSAVA

Pooling resources to turn plans into action, FAO and IFAD are forging ahead on the Global Cassava Development Strategy, following last year's International Validation Forum.

Boosting the production of cassava in order to generate income for some of the world's poorest farmers and small-scale processors in rural areas is the main objective of this joint development initiative.

With funds from IFAD, FAO is publishing the proceedings of the validation forum. The Organization is also maintaining, updating and enhancing the Global Cassava Strategy Web site (www.globalcassavastrategy.net/index.htm).

Cassava - a staple crop for more than half a billion people - was given increased attention in 1996, when IFAD started work on the Global Cassava Development Strategy.

An ideal crop for subsistence farmers, cassava can be grown in poor soils and without costly inputs such as fertilizers and pesticides, or even water. It is drought-resistant and can be harvested any time from eight to 24 months after planting and is often left in the ground as a safeguard against food shortages.

Improving processing goes hand in hand with improving production because several varieties of cassava are potentially toxic until they have been properly processed. Stepping up production, therefore, also means finding new and improved processing technologies, which generate rural employment and provide income, particularly for women.

The Implementation Plan for the Strategy was the main outcome of last year's forum. Its purpose is to facilitate the design of cassava development activities and it sets out three key areas of action: coordination; information and promotion; and linkages and integration. The Web site is a key tool in all these areas.

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MARINE RESOURCES AND ENVIRONMENTAL SURVEYS PROGRAMME

In the year 2000, FAO and IFAD worked together to assist countries bordering the Red Sea and northwest Arabian Sea and the Gulf States in designing and appraising programmes for marine resources and environmental surveys.

The assistance given to the countries aimed to:

• promote the development and management of fisheries in the region;
• establish a reliable and updated information base on the state of fishery resources to support a common policy framework on fisheries management in the region;
• develop national institutional capacities to undertake all activities related to marine resource surveys and analysis; and
• develop and institutionalize the skills, capacities and procedures used in operational fisheries management.

In the long term, it is expected that the programmes designed will make marine resource assessment surveys a reality in the Red Sea, the northwest Arabian Sea and the Gulf States. Regularly updated information on the state of exploited fishery resources - such as that provided by the surveys - is an indispensable tool for improved management and sustainable exploitation of fisheries.

Moreover, such information offers numerous additional benefits. The surveys enable scientists from universities and other research institutions to undertake basic and applied research for nominal additional costs, which would otherwise not be possible.

These surveys benefit all users of marine living resources, from inshore and artisanal fishermen through to medium- and large-scale fishing operators and other national and regional clients who require information about the marine environment.

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STRENGTHENING ANIMAL DISEASE SURVEILLANCE AND CONTROL

Animal disease surveillance and control are the first lines of defence against devastating livestock diseases such as foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) and Rift Valley fever, which can hit countries at any time. With IFAD funding, FAO has been working for five years to strengthen animal disease surveillance in North Africa and the Near East - regions where livestock play a fundamental role in the lives of hundreds of thousands of pastoralists.

RADISCON, the Regional Animal Disease Surveillance and Control Network for North Africa, the Near East and the Arab Peninsula, was set up in 1996. The Network targets 29 countries from North Africa, the Sahel, the Horn of Africa, the Near East and the Arabian Gulf.

IFAD provided a grant of US$1.25 million for the initial period of five years, which is due to close in December 2001. In addition, US$100 000 was granted by the Arab Gulf Programme for the United Nations Development Organizations (AGFUND) in support of the project's follow-up activities.

For the first time in this part of the world, RADISCON has established a regional computerized network for disease surveillance and information exchange. It has assisted in the establishment of computerized national animal disease information systems equipped with hardware, software and GIS, with veterinarians trained in epidemiology, disease surveillance, data analysis and interpretation. For example, this system is being used in Saudi Arabia and Yemen to support Rift Valley fever surveillance.

RADISCON has also facilitated the start of a sheep pox eradication programme for the Mediterranean Maghreb countries (Algeria, the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Morocco and Tunisia) that aims to eradicate the disease by the year 2005. In Algeria, the Network played a catalytic role in FMD control, which has stimulated the formulation of a regional FMD project for the Maghreb.

An IFAD mid-term evaluation has recommended a consolidation phase to ensure RADISCON's sustainability and its smooth transfer as a tool for the countries of the region.

A project proposal to strengthen the Network is being submitted to donors. This coincides with the adoption by the FAO Regional Conference for the Near East of a proposal to establish an Animal Health Commission for the Near East. During this second phase, it is proposed that RADISCON serve as a template for a smooth implementation of the Commission. IFAD is also expected to play a major role in this respect.

Phase II will focus on common disease surveillance and control problems and will respond to demand-driven needs of member countries. During this phase, RADISCON ownership will be transferred gradually to the region.

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LAND MANAGEMENT FOR FOOD PRODUCTION AND SOIL CARBON STORAGE

IFAD has funded an FAO study in Latin America and the Caribbean on the effects of different land management techniques on food production, soil protection and carbon sequestration. The project continues the collaboration between the two agencies on the Convention to Combat Desertification (CCD) and is also working to create synergies between the CCD, the Convention on Climate Change (CCC) and the Convention on Biodiversity (CBD).

Agriculture is one of the major producers of the greenhouse gases that are causing climate change, but it can also contribute significantly to the reduction of such gases in the atmosphere. Agricultural soils are one of the planet's largest reservoirs of carbon and they have the potential to expand carbon sequestration - that is, to remove carbon from the atmosphere and fix it in the soil - thus mitigating climate change.

With US$80 000 from IFAD, FAO started work in April 1999. The project's main purpose was to create a knowledge base about the effects of different land management techniques on production, soil conservation and carbon sequestration.

Studies in poor rural areas of Costa Rica, Cuba and Mexico were evaluated and documented, together with baseline carbon-related data and information on land use. Thirty technicians from Cuba and Mexico were trained in field surveying, biomass measurement and soil carbon simulation modelling.

The project also looked at the methods of assessing the stocks of carbon pools by agro-ecological zones and considered the implications of better land management - in particular zero tillage and conservation agriculture - for productivity, soil biodiversity and conservation and carbon pools.

The second phase of the project is funded by the IFAD-based Global Mechanism that mobilizes funds for the fight against desertification, and was scheduled to start on 1 September 2001. It is expected to run until 31 December 2002.

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DRAWING WATER IN WEST AFRICA

IFAD has funded a study by the International Programme for Technology and Research in Irrigation and Drainage (IPTRID) - a multidonor programme based at FAO - on ways to improve the availability and efficiency of water-lifting technologies in West Africa.

Water-lifting technologies include all ways of drawing water, from the traditional low-cost bucket, through human-powered treadle pumps, to sophisticated diesel and electric pumps. The water lifted with these devices is used mostly, though not exclusively, for irrigation.

The Fund asked IPTRID, which is hosted by FAO's Land and Water Development Division, to carry out a preliminary study of the water-lifting technologies used in a sample of West African countries. The results of the study will enable IFAD to target investments and field interventions and improve resource-poor farmers' access to affordable irrigation technologies.

IPTRID estimates that, in developing countries, irrigation increases the yields of most crops by between 100 and 400 percent. Studies in Kenya and Zimbabwe show that on plots between 0.5 and 1 ha, irrigation contributes between 25 and 80 percent of household income, allowing families to cover health and education costs and injecting extra capital into the local economies. But the effects of irrigation go beyond the farming families and their communities.

FAO estimates that irrigated agriculture produces about 40 percent of the world's food today, and will have to produce about 60 percent of the extra food required to feed a world population of around 8 billion by 2025. The bulk of improvements in food supply from irrigated agriculture are expected to come from small producers.

The IPTRID-designed research project started by looking at the water-lifting devices that are already available and being used in Chad, Ghana, Mali, Nigeria and Senegal. The next task was to design practical ways to improve water-use efficiency, cut operational costs and maximize social acceptability.

Field investigations and information-gathering were followed by a "brainstorming" meeting to review the different technologies. Indicators for long-term follow-up on their adoption by resource-poor farmers, their impacts on food production, on poverty reduction and on rural development were also proposed. The research project's final task was to prepare a technical assistance grant proposal for further testing of interventions and technological adaptations.

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JOINING FORCES WITH THE PEOPLE IN YEMEN

A joint FAO/WFP project to rehabilitate degraded areas around four major cities in Yemen started work in April 1998. The Watershed Management and Wastewater Reuse in the Peri-Urban Areas of Yemen Project was set up on the outskirts of Sana'a, Dhamar, Aden and Hodeidah.

Rapid urbanization and expansion of these cities has put extreme environmental pressure on the immediate surrounding areas. The project set out to work with the local people to improve watershed management and use treated wastewater from the cities to rehabilitate degraded land and forest resources.

Community participation was essential if the effects of the project were to be sustainable in the long term. A tool known as Community Land Resources Management Master Plans (CLRMMP) was used to structure and facilitate the participation of the local people and to ensure that women played an active part. Overall, 8 600 people were involved, more than 4 000 of them women.

The CLRMMP approach mobilizes the community: it assists in identifying strengths and weaknesses, in diagnosing problems and setting priorities, in preparing and approving master plans, in preparing mini-projects, and in implementation, monitoring and evaluation. All the stages in this process are led by the community members and are driven by the demands and priorities of the beneficiaries. The approach gives access to land and water resources to poor groups and distributes the returns from income-generating activities among individuals. In Yemen, community funds were also established to pay for community development works.

This triangle of collaboration, between the Yemeni people, FAO and WFP, has been highly effective and the participatory approach in particular received a very enthusiastic response from the communities involved.

WFP provided "food-for-work", boosting food security and enabling the people to carry out preparatory tasks, before the activities began to generate income. An impressive number and range of activities have been completed.

The people have constructed three nurseries, with the capacity to produce about 600 000 seedlings between them. They have planted about 28 ha of land with seedlings for various purposes, including windbreaks and agroforestry. They have created more than 5 km of irrigation canals, so that the seedlings can be regularly watered. About 4 km of protective green belts have been planted around villages and cities to halt the encroachment of sand dunes. More than 2.5 km of windbreaks have been planted around farms, improving agricultural production.

Wastewater treatment ponds with a capacity of 1 200 m3 have been constructed or repaired to water the tree seedlings. Sustainable grazing practices have been introduced, and 15 ha of grazing land have been rehabilitated using a naturally renewable water harvesting system.

The women had their own needs assessment and priority setting exercises and they put improved family food security firmly at the top of the list. Accordingly, 40 home gardens have been created so far, one larger horticultural site has been set up and a further six are in progress.

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DEBT REDUCTION IN EGYPT

Italy and Egypt have signed a debt swap agreement under which about US$150 million of Egyptian foreign debt to Italy will be converted to local currency and used to support poverty alleviation and food security initiatives in Egypt.

The agreement was one of the first fruits of the Rome Millennium Initiative, a joint effort between FAO, IFAD, WFP, the City of Rome and the Italian Government to extend debt relief for developing countries.

The Government of Egypt indicated various entities as beneficiaries of the debt swap proceeds, including the Ministries of Education, Health and Agriculture, as well as the Social Fund for Development.

Following a visit to Cairo by IFAD in July 2000 to discuss the Millennium Initiative with the Egyptian authorities and local representatives of FAO and WFP, the Egyptian Ministry of Agriculture and Land Reclamation (MALR) proposed a number of projects for support. The West Noubaria Rural Development Project (WNRDP) - a project that is in line with IFAD's strategy in Egypt - was one of those proposed.

In early October 2000 another IFAD mission visited Egypt as work began under the WNRDP. The mission worked with both WFP and FAO country staff and produced a report on the WNRDP on behalf of the Rome-based agencies.

A joint FAO/IFAD mission worked with the Egyptian authorities on the formulation of the project proposals. FAO provided two members - an agronomist and a financial analyst - and IFAD five - the mission leader, a marketing specialist, a rural finance specialist, a resource person and a community development specialist.

It was agreed that IFAD would provide a loan of US$15 million to finance part of the project's cost. FAO's involvement would consist principally of technical assistance in the fields of irrigation, water-user association development, and marketing extension and support provision. For WFP, the main requirement was for food supplies to new settler households. WFP would assist with the logistics of distributing food purchased using the Italian debt swap monies. The remainder of the project cost would be provided from the Italian debt swap proceeds, and contributions from the Government of Egypt and the project beneficiaries.

Dialogue between the Rome-based UN food agencies will continue in order to finalize cofinancing arrangements and give further support to the WNRDP.

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POPULAR COALITION TO ERADICATE HUNGER AND POVERTY

The work of FAO, IFAD and WFP regularly confirms that secure access to land, water and other productive assets is basic to lasting solutions to hunger and poverty. It results in increased productivity, improved household food security, greater resilience to climatic shock, improved capacity to recover from conflicts, and sustainable land use.

The three Rome-based agencies are among the core partners in the Popular Coalition to Eradicate Hunger and Poverty, an innovative collaboration of civil society, intergovernmental and governmental organizations. The Popular Coalition works to revitalize support for the property rights of the rural poor and to increase the capacity of communities to participate in the formulation of public policies that affect their livelihoods.

Improving access to land and other productive assets for the landless and the rural poor is one of the most essential but also most difficult challenges in development. The Popular Coalition is currently active in 30 countries, and also receives growing numbers of requests for support from both governments and civil society organizations which are seeking new ways to improve the asset holdings of the rural poor.

The Popular Coalition is hosted at IFAD and governed by an International Council made up of its diverse partners from civil society, FAO, WFP, the World Bank, the European Union and other intergovernmental institutions.

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STARTING FROM SCRATCH ...

When the protracted civil war in Tajikistan finally ended, Khavloeva Tojinisso and her family returned home after five harsh years in a refugee camp in Afghanistan. Home, however, was not as they remembered it: the house in Bokhtar region in south Tajikistan had had its roof blown off; inside, looters had stripped it of all the furnishings.

Tojinisso, 44, and her family of eight started their lives over - literally from scratch. They built a makeshift house of clay and wood with their own hands and this is where they still live. Tojinisso's husband, who suffers from epilepsy and chronic malaria, is practically bedridden.

So Tojinisso had to fend for herself and her family. Fortunately, she was able to grow her own food on a small piece of land that she farms rent-free under an arrangement between WFP and the government. In return, she gives a small part of her harvest to the government. Tojinisso, who now cultivates 0.25 ha, also received food aid and wheat seeds. The seeds, together with fertilizers and agricultural tools, were provided by FAO. "My children and I prepared the land and sowed the wheat," Tojinisso said. "We hope to have a good harvest." Until it arrives, she has 225 kg of wheat flour from WFP to get through the summer.

Tojinisso is one of many Tajik women who have to grapple with the aftermath of the breakup of the Soviet Union, the disappearance of state social services and a five-year civil war that decimated the country. About 85 percent of the population live below the poverty line. In order to survive, many have been forced into illegal trades such as drug smuggling (which carries severe prison sentences for those apprehended) and prostitution.

While Tajik women have benefited from recently enacted antidiscrimination legislation, they need help to regain the status they enjoyed during the Soviet era, when they had equal access to education and employment. Fortunately, they have also had the support of hundreds of local NGOs.

Given the economic problems of Tajikistan, WFP has undertaken a wide range of projects designed to give more than 20 000 widows, returnees and household heads a helping hand. In addition to the farm scheme, WFP supports training and income-generation programmes and school feeding schemes, and provides assistance to the health sector. Even within its own staff, WFP seeks to help more women. In the southern province of Khatlon where a large part of WFP activities in the country take place, most of the WFP food aid monitors are women.

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POOLING EXPERTISE TO HELP WOMEN IN WAR AND NATURAL DISASTERS

Experts from FAO and WFP are working together to identify ways to alleviate the special suffering of women and girls in wartime and times of emergency, and draw on their strong coping strategies.

FAO's Women in Development and Special Relief Operations Services are collaborating with WFP to prepare a set of guidelines on socio-economic and gender analysis for emergency programmes. These guidelines are part of FAO's Socio-economic and Gender Analysis Programme (SEAGA) support for the Consolidated Appeal Process (CAP), whose theme for 2001 is "Women and war".

Emergencies affect women and girls very differently from men and boys. In wartime, men are generally the primary casualties, while women often find themselves unable to feed their families owing to loss of seeds, livestock and tools.

Conflict situations also drastically increase the trauma of gender-specific physical insecurity. This is particularly true in remote rural areas far away from media coverage, where violations are often either ignored or unreported. Women's lower social and economic status makes them even more vulnerable in times of emergency.

Gender analysis is a tool that helps to clarify the specific needs and priorities, vulnerabilities and coping strategies of women and men, so that they can be more adequately addressed in an emergency situation. Lessons learned from emergency response reveal that interventions and life-saving strategies are more efficient and timely when gender differences have been properly understood and addressed.

The main objective of the FAO/WFP guidelines is to ensure more effective humanitarian assistance by mainstreaming gender analysis throughout the emergency response sequence, leading to quicker and more sustainable recovery, especially for the most disadvantaged people.

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RAPID NUTRITION SURVEYS IN CHINA

IFAD and WFP have a solid track record of collaboration in China, including six joint projects to date. Joint programming has been a major achievement, reinforced by the use of vulnerability analysis and mapping as tools for identifying priority project areas. Building on this framework for cooperation, the two agencies have accelerated the field-testing of practical methodologies to improve project design, targeting, and estimation of project impact.

An important step in this process was the initiation of rapid nutrition surveys to establish benchmarks on childhood malnutrition. High levels of chronic malnutrition among children signal long-term deprivation and persistent vulnerability. The relevance of this information for development projects is twofold:

• Identifying areas characterized by chronic malnutrition facilitates accurate targeting of projects.
• Demonstrating a reduction in levels of malnutrition provides compelling evidence of meaningful impact.

In October 2000, IFAD and WFP piloted a rapid nutrition survey with project staff from the Qinling Mountain Area Poverty Alleviation Project in Shaanxi Province. Following a series of hands-on training sessions, the survey team was able to visit 30 villages, weighing and measuring some 600 young children during less than a week of fieldwork. Subsequent data entry and analysis clearly showed that chronic malnutrition is a serious concern in the project area, and established a benchmark for future evaluations (in 2003 and 2006).

In addition to the successful completion of the pilot assessment, there have also been encouraging signs of sustainability. Less than a month after the rapid nutrition survey in Shaanxi, trained project staff were able to replicate the survey in Hubei Province - without any external assistance. Confirming the trend, in April 2001 the West Guangxi Poverty Alleviation Project took up the same survey methodology as part of its project baseline.

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SINCE 1999 ...

• The number of beneficiaries reached by joint collaboration between FAO, IFAD and WFP has quadrupled to almost nine million people in all regions of the world.
• There have been a total of 75 joint initiatives between FAO and IFAD, 65 between FAO and WFP and 7 between IFAD and WFP.
• FAO and WFP carried out a total of 50 Joint Crop and Food Supply Assessment Missions to countries in special need: 25 in Asia (including CIS-Asia), 16 in Africa, 7 in Eastern Europe (including CIS-Europe) and 2 in Latin America
  

1999 and 2000 Versions of FAO/IFAD/WFP - Working togther to fight hunger and poverty