Madagascar : increasing food security and nutrition

Madagascar: Increasing Food Security and Nutrition Page 1 of 4 THE WORLD BANK GROUP Findings reports on ongoing operational, economic and sector work carried out by the World Bank and its member governments in the Africa Region. It is published periodically by the Africa Technical Department on behalf of the Region. Madagascar : Increasing Food Security and Nutrition Despite high economic potential, poverty has been increasing steadily in Madagascar since the early 1 960s and it is estimated that almost 54% of the population was living below the poverty line in 1993. Rural areas are estimated to account for 92% of the poor. The quality of basic education and health services has declined sharply: Madagascar is one of the few countries in the developing world where the younger generation is likely to have a worse educational attainment than that of its parents. The infant mortality rate is 107 and 75 per 1000 live births respectively in the rural and urban areas Between 45% to 49% of children are malnourished when measured by height for age or weight for age. Housing conditions are poor, with 53% of households living in a single room and poor households crowded in at the rate of 6 persons per room. Over 60% of households obtain their water from easily polluted sources such as lakes, rivers and ponds while 12.5% obtain water from public taps. Only accelerated, employment-generating growth can result in significant and broad-based poverty reduction. The Madagascar Food Security and Nutrition (SECALINE ) Project, operational since mid- 1993, is designed to address poverty, food insecurity and malnutrition in areas with a particularly high incidence of poverty. The objectives of the project are to reduce food insecurity and malnutrition by empowering communities to help themselves. It combines a mixture of three interlinked approaches to achieving these objectives including: * support for income generating activities; * nutrition programs; and * institutional development to increase national awareness and capacity to combat poverty, food http://www.worldbank.org/afr/findings/english/find45.htm 11/2/2001  Madagascar: Increasing Food Security and Nutrition Page 2 of 4 insecurity and malnutrition. Considering that several Bank projects have had a poor execution record in Madagascar, this project had achieved substantial progress at the end of its first full year of operation: During this period, the project's social fund has helped create 213,000 person-days of temporary employment, financed 114 contracts with micro and small enterprises, and supported sustainable income-generating activities by 10 NGOs. Also, during the last three months in 1994, the project's food-for-work component created almost 20,000 person days (62% among women) of employment linked to cleaning up poor neighborhoods. Malnutrition in target communities has fallen from 19% to 12% (a reduction of about 40%). The iodine deficiency disorders component completed its phase of distributing iodized capsules and is now providing equipment and support to the private sector to iodize salt. An Information, Education and Communication (IEC) campaign has been launched to promote improved nutritional habits and the importance of using iodized salt. A National Food Security Strategy is being prepared by bringing together all studies done in various departments and institutions. A draft paper taking stock of all studies so far has been prepared. This project's success can be attributed to: i the involvement of beneficiaries at all stages; , a widely-attended project launch workshop involving people ranging from Cabinet Ministers to poor peasants, which helped to increase borrower ownership; , active collaboration with NGOs;