USAID’s Resilience in the Sahel Enhanced (RISE) initiative is strengthening the resilience of chronically vulnerable households and communities in Niger and Burkina Faso.
In just a few years, USAID’s RISE initiative is making promising progress on strengthening the resilience of chronically vulnerable households and communities in Niger and Burkina Faso. A recent mid-term analysis indicates that households in communities reached by RISE programs experienced a wide-range of shocks in 2017, including droughts, price spikes, disease and illnesses. As a result, their overall shock exposure was significantly higher in 2017 (midterm) than in 2015 (baseline). However, the analysis also shows that households in communities reached by RISE were better able to manage these shocks and maintain or increase their assets, savings and access to markets in comparison to households in other communities.
Assets, savings, and access to markets were also associated with the ability of households to maintain their food security and recover from shocks, suggesting these are important sources of resilience in their own right. In addition, households in communities reached by RISE had more diverse livelihoods and relied less on government assistance to cope with shocks, both in relation to 2015 (baseline) and households in other communities.
RESILIENCE IN THE SAHEL ENHANCED (RISE) is a comprehensive set of USAID humanitarian and development programs that expand economic opportunities in and outside of agriculture, strengthen natural resources, conflict and disaster risk management and improve health and human capital in areas of Niger and Burkina Faso subject to recurrent humanitarian crises. A full impact evaluation is planned for 2020.