The Most Severe Drought in 40 Years, Four Years On...

By Shira Garbis, Programme Officer

World Food Day is a global celebration commemorating the founding of the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) in 1945. Spreading awareness of global hunger and inspiring collective action, the annual celebration unites governments, businesses, Civil Society Organisations (CSOs), and communities alike1.

In honour of World Food Day, SEED is taking a close look at food access and insecurity in Madagascar, reflecting on successes of past food security projects and sharing new directions for the coming years.

Food Access and Insecurity Across Madagascar

In Madagascar, a changing climate and four consecutive years of failed rains in the Grand Sud and Grand Sud Est regions have led to the country’s most severe drought in 40 years and significantly reduced the production of staple foods, including rice, cassava, and maise.2,3?This decline in food supply has resulted in extreme food shortages amplified by a complex mix of factors, including the COVID-19 pandemic, increased cyclone activity, pest infestations, and rising global food prices4. Collectively, these factors have caused a food insecurity crisis, with approximately 1.08 million people across the Grand Sud and Grand Sud Est regions experiencing high levels of acute food insecurity5.?

In 2021, SEED launched a two-year Emergency Food Distribution Programme to respond to these challenges and improve the health and resilience of communities. Under this programme, SEED worked closely with the National Ministry of Health and the Regional Nutrition Cluster to provide emergency food relief to 18 communities across the Anosy region of Madagascar. In collaboration with community health workers, SEED’s Emergency Food Distribution Programme adopted a community-centred approach to distributing ready-to-use supplementary food (RUSF) and protection rations of rice, beans, and oil to malnourished children and their families.

Successes of SEED’s Emergency Food Distribution Programme

Between 2021 and 2023, SEED supported the recovery of 4,134 children aged 6-59 months with moderate acute malnutrition (MAM). Children diagnosed with severe acute malnutrition (SAM) were referred to their local health centres for specialised care, facilitating the recovery of an additional 431 children. SEED also distributed protection rations of rice, beans, and oil to 27,334 family members of malnourished children enrolled in the programme. Through this three-pronged approach, SEED’s Emergency Food Distribution Programme successfully fostered a 94% recovery rate amongst children diagnosed with MAM and SAM.

Whilst the distribution of emergency food assistance supported the well-being and livelihoods of communities, SEED’s model of development focuses on enhancing communities’ capacity to resist external shocks. To achieve this, SEED prioritised working with health centre staff and community health workers to equip them with the skills and knowledge to identify, monitor, and treat infant and childhood malnutrition and related illnesses. SEED also supported community healthcare workers to conduct family planning outreach within their communities, seeking to enhance community awareness and foster positive attitudes towards the complimentary family planning services available at local health centres. This outreach resulted in 19,206 visits to healthcare centres by women and girls who accessed a range of family planning services, with 6,745 of these individuals being first-time users.

Understanding Sustainable Development

When working in the field of humanitarian assistance, it is useful to take a step back and contextualise projects by looking through the broader lens of development. At a global level, the commonly accepted definition of development has evolved over time. In the mid-20th century, development was understood to be strictly an economic issue, indicated by countries’ linear progression towards the use of modern technology and “a mature economy.”6 Then, in the 1970s, a needs-based approach to development was introduced, broadening the world’s understanding to include areas such as education, health, and sanitation.7

From this point, our understanding of development has evolved over the past 50 years, becoming increasingly holistic. And today, thanks to the United Nations, much of the world understands development through the lens of sustainability; a process “that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”8 The United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which were launched in 2015, act as a blueprint for the realisation of development that is both sustainable and holistic.9 Sustainable Development Goal 2, ‘Zero Hunger,’ is particularly relevant in the context of World Food Day, and guides SEED’s approach to addressing food insecurity.10

Moving Forward

Despite ongoing humanitarian efforts to deliver nutritional support, over 1.08 million people in the southeast of Madagascar are still experiencing acute food insecurity.11 Due to the accumulation of social and environmental stressors associated with the drought, rates of MAM and SAM are predicted to significantly increase across Madagascar through to April of 2024, with the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) forecasting 196,451 additional cases in the southeast region alone.12

In response to this challenge, SEED is collaborating with the German Federal Foreign Office and Humedica to launch a three-year food distribution project based in the southeast Anosy region of Madagascar. Project Miatrika, which means resilience in Malagasy, is built in response to the successes and learnings of SEED’s past food distribution work and will seek to reduce rates of acute malnutrition across the region. In alignment with SEED’s development model, Project Miatrika will also seek to enhance community resilience through improving health service delivery and capacity and promoting positive social behaviour change across the 20 communities reached by the project.

Project Miatrika will continue to distribute RUSF and unprepared food rations to children with moderate acute malnutrition and their families. SEED will additionally engage directly with community members through a variety of channels: the training of mothers and caregivers on early screening of childhood malnutrition and self-referral to community health centres; the creation of community care groups where people can share local, up-to-date coping mechanisms to combat malnutrition; and facilitation of community behaviour change sessions. Through these activities, Project Miatrika aims to build community resilience to resist the external shocks that have led to food insecurity in the region.

In the spirit of World Food Day, SEED looks forward to collaborating with the German Federal Foreign Office and Humedica to attain sustainable progress towards the FAO’s aim of improving food security on the global scale through collective efforts that address malnutrition and protect “the future of food, people, and the planet.”13

References

1. Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations, “About World Food Day,” accessed October 9, 2023, https://www.fao.org/world-food-day/about/en.

2.??Alexandra Nizet, “Madagascar: A Humanitarian Emergency Driven by the Climate Crisis,” Doctors of the World, May 2, 2023, https://doctorsoftheworld.org/blog/madagascar-climate-crisis/.; United Nations University, “From Drought to Hunger: 5 Facts on Southern Madagascar’s Food Insecurity - Institute for Environment and Human Security,” ehs.unu.edu, November 23, 2022, https://ehs.unu.edu/news/news/from-drought-to-hunger-5-facts-on-southern-madagascars-food-insecurity.html.

3.??United Nations University , “From Drought to Hunger: 5 Facts on Southern Madagascar’s Food Insecurity - Institute for Environment and Human Security,” ehs.unu.edu, November 23, 2022, https://ehs.unu.edu/news/news/from-drought-to-hunger-5-facts-on-southern-madagascars-food-insecurity.html.

4.?Dominique Fayad, “Food Insecurity and Climate Shocks in Madagascar,” International Monetary Fund 2023, no. 037 (June 1, 2023): 1–1, https://doi.org/10.5089/9798400242601.018.

5.?“Madagascar: Acute Food Insecurity Situation for July - September 2023 and Projections for October - December 2023 and January - April 2024?| IPC - Integrated Food Security Phase Classification,” IPC, accessed October 9, 2023, https://www.ipcinfo.org/ipc-country-analysis/details-map/en/c/1156532/?iso3=MDG.

6.?Bawa, Kamaljit S., and Reinmar Seidler, eds. Dimensions of Sustainable Development. Google Books. Vol. 1. Oxford, United Kingdom: Eolss Publications, 2009. https://books.google.mg/books?id=lyBlCwAAQBAJ&lpg=PA21&ots=k3zvklgCMb&dq=sustainable%20development%20AND%20multidimensional&lr&pg=PP4#v=onepage&q&f=false. ; Rostow, Walt Whitman. The Stages of Economic Growth: A Non-Communist Manifesto. Google Books. Cambridge University Press, 1960. https://www.google.mg/books/edition/The_Stages_of_Economic_Growth/yZNwKHku4UoC?hl=en&gbpv=1.

7.?Bawa, Kamaljit S., and Reinmar Seidler, eds. Dimensions of Sustainable Development. Google Books. Vol. 1. Oxford, United Kingdom: Eolss Publications, 2009. https://books.google.mg/books?id=lyBlCwAAQBAJ&lpg=PA21&ots=k3zvklgCMb&dq=sustainable%20development%20AND%20multidimensional&lr&pg=PP4#v=onepage&q&f=false. ; Khadka, Raj. “Switching Gears: From Needs to Assets Based Approach to Community Development in Nepal.” Ontario International Development Agency Journal of Sustainable Development 3, no. 11 (2012). https://ssrn.com/abstract=2047887.

8. Federal Office for Spatial Development. “1987: Brundtland Report.” www.are.admin.ch, 1987. https://www.are.admin.ch/are/en/home/media/publications/sustainable-development/brundtland-report.html.

9. United Nations. “The 17 Sustainable Development Goals.” United Nations. United Nations, 2015. https://sdgs.un.org/goals.

10. United Nations. “The 17 Sustainable Development Goals.” United Nations. United Nations, 2015. https://sdgs.un.org/goals.

11.?Integrated Food Security Phase Classification. “Madagascar [Grand Sud & Grand Sud-Est]: Food Security & Nutrition Snapshot.” Integrated Food Security Phase Classification. IPC. Accessed September 8, 2023. https://www.ipcinfo.org/index.php?id=94934.

12. Ibid.

13. Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations, “About World Food Day,” accessed October 9, 2023, https://www.fao.org/world-food-day/about/en.