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FY 1997 Development Fund for Africa: $5,958,172
Introduction.
The United States has many interests in the strategically important and politically troubled region of east and southern Africa. These interests are focused on facilitating a transition to democratic governments, and promoting the establishment of productive, market-oriented economies. The vast mineral wealth and growing markets in east and southern Africa offer a unique potential for American investment and for the export of American goods and services. In addition, many of the countries in the region traditionally serve as critical access points for U. S. military forces in times of emergency. Thus, it is the aim of the United States to maintain and enhance longstanding political and economic ties in the region.
The USAID regional office plays a key role in furthering the achievement of U.S. economic, political and humanitarian assistance objectives in 21 countries in east and southern Africa that receive USAID assistance. The USAID regional office is in a unique position to add value to its service role by furnishing information critical to the successful achievement of bilateral strategic objectives, while focusing on transnational approaches and solutions to long-term development issues. An example of this regional approach is the key contribution the USAID regional office makes to the strategic planning and coordination essential to the achievement of the food security, conflict mitigation, and family planning objectives of the Greater Horn of Africa Initiative (GHAI).
The Development Challenge.
In recent years, the countries of east and southern Africa have undertaken significant national efforts to address critical development challenges. However, the fact that many of these challenges persist, with impacts that reach across national boundaries, is an indication of the need for better coordinated regional approaches and solutions which may not have been attempted in the past. These challenges include:
-- Natural disasters, including severe droughts which periodically afflict vast areas of the region and constrain the achievement of sustainable development objectives;
-- High population growth rates that continue to outstrip gains in agricultural production, making future food security in the region a steadily deteriorating prospect;
-- The Human Immunodeficiency Virus-Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (HIV-AIDS) pandemic has its epicenter in the region with nine of the ESA countries having seropositive rates over 10%. Recent studies suggest that by the year 2000 economic growth in some of the key countries in the region will be reduced by as much as 20% due to negative economic consequences of HIV-AIDS; and,
-- Limited progress in democratization and governance continues to hinder economic and social development throughout the region. Although significant gains have been registered in Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Uganda, widespread corruption, governmental instability and potential civil unrest continue to inhibit progress in a number of cases.
The USAID regional office's ability to focus its specialized pool of regional expertise on those areas where there may be informational and/or experiential gaps, has proven to be of invaluable assistance to USAID missions, government and non-government organizations (NGOs), and private sector entities. In recent years, this provision of technical assistance has been supplemented by the knowledge that USAID staff has gained from initiating an innovative regional portfolio concentrated on pilot efforts to overcome specific regional constraints.
Other Donors.
A host of multilateral and bilateral donors are actively engaged in east and southern Africa. Recent discussions, both at headquarters and at country level, have focused attention on the utility of a regional orientation to emergency relief and development assistance. The USAID regional office plays a pivotal coordination role in this dialogue. Inagriculture and natural resources management, USAID regional office collaborates with the donor community in strengthening support for the Association of Agricultural Research in East and Central Africa and its affiliated National Agricultural Research Systems. These organizations work with selected regional research networks to promote increased technology transfer and commercialization of technology activities within and among east African countries. In health and population, USAID and the World Bank have jointly programmed sustainable health financing efforts on a regional basis, while promoting family planning training. Through the Center for African Family Studies (CAFS), a regional family planning NGO, there has been increased USAID coordination with the British Overseas Development Administration, the Swedish International Development Agency, and the Canadian International Development Agency. In addition, coordination efforts are also underway with the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) to identify common adolescent reproductive health and child survival issues, while successful joint programming of HIV-AIDS prevention resources has already occurred with the European Union (EU). Thus, USAID strives to ensure that diminishing U.S. resources are applied judiciously to high priority situations, while leveraging contributions of other bilateral and multilateral donors.
FY 1997 Program.
To advance the attainment of broad-based sustainable development throughout the region, USAID has selected four strategic objectives which cut across each of the Agency's five strategic goals. In FY 1997, USAID will continue to emphasize the provision of vitally needed technical and programmatic support services to client USAID missions, government and NGOs, and private entities throughout the region. In addition, staff will increasingly be engaged in the management of innovative activities to enhance USAID "value-added" regional contribution to the solution of such transnational issues as: the prevention of HIV-AIDS; the promotion of inter-country trade; the development of the private sector; the prevention of environmental degradation; and the implementation of regional programs, e.g., the GHAI and the Initiative for Southern Africa (ISA).
Agency Goal: Encouraging Broad-based Economic Growth
USAID supports regional economic growth objectives through the provision of expert advisory services and by managing regionally oriented activities aimed at addressing critical development challenges. These challenges include: the prevention of the spread of HIV/AIDS; enhancing the effectiveness and coverage of self-sustaining health care systems; the identification and mitigation of constraints to increasing intra-regional trade; the expansion of women-owned businesses and their full integration into the formal business sector; the reform of economic regulations and policies; and developing a significant private sector role in the attainment of GHAI food security objectives and income generation objectives of the ISA. In FY 1995, USAID assisted in the mitigation of critical constraints to economic growth by: convening the first region-wide workshop for government and non-government health professionals on HIV-AIDS and gender related issues; sharing of Kenyan health financing practices with Ethiopian colleagues in the design of a new Ethiopian Health Program and the training of key Ethiopian staff; the development of a plan to establish women's business associations to promote the expansion of women-owned businesses in the region; and the initiation of a series of regional workshops bringing together--for the first time--policy makers, business people, and NGOs to develop an Action Plan to eliminate policies and regulatory constraints to inter-country trade throughout east Africa.
Economic growth funding requested in FY 1997 will enable USAID to continue to respond to a significant level of requests for technical assistance. The funding will also allow continuation of regional activities focused on priority challenges not presently being addressed, including: a study of, and workshops on, constraints to trade and transportation in Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia; joint donor meetings with Ministries of Health in the region that are planning and/or undergoing decentralization; to present the findings of the USAID-funded World Health Organization study on the decentralization of health systems and to draw up a priority list of policy reforms, research, and decentralization programs; to complete a survey of the private sector in the GHA countries; and to convene a workshop for government, NGO and private sector entities on developing a regional plan for private sector participation in GHAI food security activities.
Population funding requested for FY 1997 will permit USAID to maintain its high quality regional population expertise, as well as continue technical assistance to CAFS, the leading, self-sustaining African family planning and population institution.
Agency Goal: Protecting the Environment
Seven USAID country programs focus on the protection of the environment. However, a number of these efforts have consequences that cross national boundaries. Thus, the regional challenge is to strengthen regional institutional capacity to identify and manage scarce natural resources, i.e., coastal and biodiverse plant and animal resources. USAID provides support services to assist in the achievement of these objectives, while managing innovative regionally-oriented activities that are focussed on the protection of the environment.
In FY 1995, USAID responded to increased requests for assistance by providing a pool of regional environmental expertise in natural resources management, biodiversity, and environmental assessments. By substantially augmenting available environmental information, the capability of regional decision makers to set environmentally sound policies was reinforced. In addition, the management of the following activities contributed to the achievement of the regional environmental protection agenda: development and testing of an innovative training program to enhance USAID, governmental and non-governmental institutional capacity to conduct Environmental Impact Assessments; oversight of coastal resources management programs; and convening the first regional workshop on strategies for sustainability with 13 countries and regional organizations. These countries and organizations are discussing national and local environmental strategic planning and regional support programs.
Funding requested for FY 1997 will permit USAID to maintain its high quality regional expertise, while continuing innovative activities addressing critical environmental challenges. These include: cataloguing and disseminating data on trade in rare plants and animals for medicinal purposes so as to understand and improve legal trade, while limiting threats to biodiversity; a study of governmental policies and regulations in the region with negative impact on the environment; and a subsequent series of workshops for governmental and non-governmental leaders to discuss the results of the study and recommend a course of corrective actions.
Agency Goal: Building Democracy
The civil strife, ethnic tension and corruption that continue to plague countries in east and southern Africa have led 16 USAID country programs to adopt strategies to build democracy. USAID provides support in the design andmonitoring of activities, while coordinating efforts to review, approve and provide oversight to critical GHAI conflict prevention, mitigation and resolution activities.
In FY 1995, USAID contributed to the achievement of a variety of results that greatly reduced tensions and the level of civil strife in the region. These efforts include: the successful completion of Mozambique's first multiparty elections; Uganda's successful Constituent Assembly elections and that Assembly's approval of a new constitution; the continued efforts in Kenya to reduce ethnic clashes and monitor the elimination of human rights violations; and Eritrea's on-going participatory development of its first constitution. Similarly, USAID technical support and advice are pivotal in the strengthening of democratic institutions in both Namibia and South Africa.
The FY 1997 requested funding for building democracy will enable USAID to maintain high quality democracy and governance advisory services for USAID missions, governments and NGOs in the region, while allowing USAID to continue to play a key role in formulating and coordinating conflict prevention and mitigation activities and strategies under the GHAI.
Agency Goal: Providing Humanitarian Assistance
Historically, the east and southern Africa region has been devastated by repeated manmade and natural disasters. For more than a decade, growing numbers of "at-risk" and refugee populations have affected economic and political stability in the region. Consequently, donor efforts to promote the transition from relief to sustainable development have been substantially stymied. Therefore, six of the ESA missions have focused on humanitarian assistance. USAID's regional expertise provides critical inputs by focusing on the management of emergency food resources and planning strategies to achieve GHAI food security objectives.
In FY 1995, USAID staff: assisted ESA missions to design and implement programs and coordinate communications to help respond more effectively to disasters and emergencies, including the direct management of the southern Sudan emergency food and disaster relief operation, while initiating pilot efforts to utilize humanitarian assistance resources developmentally; supervised the Famine Early Warning Systems III project to provide decision makers with remote surveillance imagery and analysis of agro-climatic and socio-economic famine threats in the region; continued to monitor and report on relief operations in Rwanda; provided critical inputs to the development of food security strategies for Ethiopia, Eritrea, Mozambique, and Somalia; and, assessed food needs in Angola, Malawi, and Zambia.
USAID's FY 1997 request for funding will continue regional activities including: addressing the requirements of the southern Sudan population (estimated $16 - $20 million in disaster assistance funding and 25,000 metric tons of P.L. 480, Title II emergency food); monetization and programming of resources in the field for pilot activities promoting the transition from relief to development (approximately 70,000 metric tons of P.L. 480, Title II emergency resources and delegation of appropriate authority to the field); and, coordinating the development and implementation of national and regional food security strategies for the GHAI.
| Encouraging Broad-based Economic Growth | Stabilizing World Population Growth & Protecting Human Health | Protecting the Environment | Building Democracy | Providing Humanitarian Assistance | TOTALS | |
| USAID Strategic Objectives | ||||||
|
Special Support Objective 1. Effective Program and Technical Support to all ESA Missions - Dev. Fund for Africa |
1,083,000 |
410,000 |
200,000 |
90,000 |
|
1,783,000 |
|
2. Increased Utilization of Critical Information by USAID and Other Decision Makers in the ESA Region - Dev. Fund for Africa |
1,226,143 |
2,048,172 |
180,000 |
62,857 |
3,517,172 |
|
|
3. Establish a Strong Basis for Implementation of the Greater Horn of Africa Initiative - Dev. Fund for Africa |
367,286 |
20,000 |
155,714 |
70,000 |
|
613,000 |
|
4. Effective Delivery of USAID's Humanitarian Assistance - Dev. Fund for Africa |
45,000 |
|
|
|
|
45,000 |
|
Totals - Dev. Fund for Africa |
2,721,429 |
2,478,172 |
535,714 |
222,857 |
|
5,958,172 |
USAID Mission Director: Keith E. Brown
PROGRAM: REDSO/ESA
TITLE AND NUMBER: Effective Program and Technical Support to all ESA Missions, 623-SS01
STATUS: Continuing
PROPOSED OBLIGATION AND FUNDING SOURCE: FY 1997: $1,783,000 DFA
INITIAL OBLIGATION: FY 1996; ESTIMATED COMPLETION: Continuing
Purpose: To provide effective program and technical support to all east and southern Africa missions.
Background: The provision of effective program and technical support to all east and southern Africa missions has been the main objective of the Regional Economic Development and Services Office for East and Southern Africa since it was established in 1972. USAID missions in the region often require specialized advisory services to supplement their own staffs in the development of specific aspects of strategic plans; in designing and achieving results packages; and, in monitoring and evaluating progress in attaining targeted outcomes. Thus, as the regional support field mission's repository of high quality expertise fills critical informational and technical gaps throughout east and southern Africa. In FY 1994 and FY 1995, the USAID regional office continued to receive an increasing number of requests for its support services and technical expertise. The high level of demand is seen as one indicator of the USAID regional office's effectiveness.
USAID Role and Achievements to Date: The USAID regional office has provided key inputs to all of the principal development programs that USAID has designed, implemented and/or supported in the region. As a service-oriented entity, the USAID regional office contributes to the achievement of the strategic objectives of the client ESA missions, but is not involved directly in the actual attainment and measurement of the people-level impact of these efforts.
Description: The USAID regional office is the repository of a significant portion of USAID's program and technical expetise in the ESA region. The annual scheduling of USAID regional office staff is negotiated with client missions early in the fiscal year. Requests from the 21 ESA missions are matched with Africa Bureau and Agency priorities so as to best fit available skills to the required work assignments throughout the region. Travel often exceeds 50% of the individual's available time. Recently, the work accomplished on these travel assignments has been supplemented by support from Nairobi via electronic communication facilities. Electronic mail, telephone and/or fax provide an extremely cost-effective method to respond to client mission needs. Increasingly, USAID's funding has contributed to updating communications facilities.
Host Country and Other Donors: USAID staff regularly work with governmental and donor agency staff at the bilateral and regional level to ensure effective donor coordination and programming of scarce development resources. An example of effective donor coordination USAID's leadership of the first U.S./Japanese Common Agenda Joint Evaluation of the Zambia HIV/AIDS Project in September 1995.
Beneficiaries: USAID missions in east and southern Africa are the primary beneficiaries of the services provided by the USAID regional office staff. In turn these bilateral missions implement programs directly affecting the people in these countries.
Principal Contractors, Grantees, or Agencies: In addition to a cadre of foreign service officers and personal services contractors, a variety of fellows and institutional contractors make up the staff of the USAID regional office. In recent years, these in-house skills have been supplemented with the establishment of local indefinite quantity contracts in specific fields that may not be required in the USAID regional office on a long-term, in-house basis. This arrangement has proven to be an extremely cost-effective and efficient means of providing support services to client missions in the development of the private sector, e.g., Price Waterhouse Inc., Deloitte and Touche Inc., and Development Alternatives, Inc. and in financial management, e.g., Price Waterhouse Inc., Peat Marwick Inc., and Ernst and Young Inc.
Major Results Indicators:
Baseline1/ Annual Target
REDSO achievement of service days TBD (1995) 70 (1996)
planned.
ESA missions satisfied with REDSO TBD (1995) 80 (1996)
support services.
Requests for REDSO/ESA services TBD (1995) 70 (1996)
satisfied in each of the major skill categories.
REDSO staff trained in reengineering 0 (1995) 80 (1996)
PROGRAM: REDSO/ESA
TITLE AND NUMBER: Increased Utilization of Critical Information by USAID and Other Decision-makers in the Region, 623-S002
STATUS: Continuing
PROPOSED OBLIGATION AND FUNDING SOURCE: FY 1997 $3,517,172 DFA
INITIAL OBLIGATION: FY 1995; ESTIMATED COMPLETION DATE: FY 2000
Purpose: Increased utilization of critical information by USAID and other decision makers in the region.
Background: The Regional Economic Development and Services Office for East and Southern Africa, is in a unique position to add value to its service role by furnishing information critical to the successful achievement of bilateral strategic objectives. This added value also accrues to USAID missions through strengthened host country capacities in information generation, analysis, dissemination and use. The term "information" is defined here to encompass much more than raw data and information produced through its analysis; it includes such important information concepts as lessons learned, models, technologies, and other types of formal and informal communications exchange.
USAID Role and Achievements to Date: The USAID regional office works with client USAID missions, collaborating governments, private sector individuals and institutions, universities, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and private voluntary organizations (PVOs) to develop, analyze, disseminate and use critical information on priority regional development issues. Achievements to date include:
(1) Regional Trade Studies - Comparative analysis of Economic Reform and Structural Adjustment Programs in east Africa (emphasis on agriculture and trade policies) completed and results disseminated. In addition, a unique team-
building exercise to initiate this study in southern Africa was completed with country-teams from Malawi, Mozambique, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
(2) Regional Health Networks - Improved design and implementation of health programs in the region by sharing successful health financing experiences among counterparts in other countries.
(3) Center for African Family Studies (CAFS) III - the USAID regional office support has enabled CAFS, a regional NGO, to provide family planning training to service providers in Africa; and to substantially strengthen and expand its training programs for family planning professionals.
(4) All-African Businesswomen's Association (AABA) - The development of five country assessments as a baseline on which to determine current environment in which African women entrepreneurs operate as a basis for future measurements of the improvement of businesswomen's access to information and services.
Description: The six major ongoing activities that will continue through FY 1997 are:
(1) Regional Trade Studies. To identify the impact of evolving trade and agricultural policies on agricultural and food security in the region. The analyses generated will be used to inform policy makers and encourage appropriate policy responses to achieve stated national and regional objectives concerning trade, agricultural production and food security.
(2) Regional Health Networks. To maximize USAID's regional investment in child survival, reproductive health, AIDS and other health initiatives by sharing, adapting, and borrowing lessons learned across borders;
(3) CAFS. To develop a stable, self-reliant, market-oriented African institution that can effectively transfer modern family planning/reproductive health technologies to family planning and reproductive health programs in both the private and public sectors;
(4) AABA. To increase income through increased access of African women to the information and services needed to operate successful businesses. This will involve the establishment of effective national and/or regional businesswomen's associations and, through them, improve the environment for African women entrepreneurs;
(5) Sustainable Agricultural Transformation. To promote regional cooperation for productive and sustainable agricultural and natural resources management technology development and transfer in east Africa; and
(6) GHAI Regional Environmental Cooperation. To promote enhanced regional cooperation for sustainable environmental and natural resources management within the Greater Horn of Africa.
Host Country and Other Donors: In the Regional Trade Activity, USAID collaborates with the United Nation's (UN) Office on Regional Development, the UN Center for Trade and Development, the World Bank, and the Cross Border Initiative which includes the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the European Union and the African Development Bank. In the Regional Health Networks, USAID collaborates with the Overseas Development Administration of the United Kingdom, and with the World Bank. CAFS also receives funding from the International Planned Parenthood Federation, Canada, and Sweden. USAID collaborates on AABA with the World Bank and the Friedrich Ebert Foundation, which fund complementary activities. In the Sustainable Agricultural Transformation activities, USAID works with co-funders including the World Bank's Special Program for African Agricultural Research, the Global Coalition for Africa, and the International Agricultural Research Centers. In the Greater Horn of Africa Initiative (GHAI) Regional Environmental Cooperation the USAID regional office works with many multinational and bilateral donors currently involved at different levels of regional sector development.
Beneficiaries: Intermediate beneficiaries include collaborating governments, private sector individuals and institutions; universities; NGOs and private voluntary organizations (PVOs); the USAID regional office's client missions; and other USAID offices. Ultimate beneficiaries include: Regional Trade--all people in the Greater Horn of Africa and southern Africa; Regional Health Networks--mothers and children under five years of age in east and southern Africa; CAFS--providers, users, and potential users of family planning/reproductive health services throughout sub-Saharan Africa; AABA--women entrepreneurs in the ESA region; Sustainable Agricultural Transformation--farmers, ranchers and other resource users in East Africa; and, GHAI Environmental Collaboration--
farmers, ranchers, fishermen and other local resource users throughout the Greater Horn of Africa.
Principal Contractors, Grantees, or Agencies: Technoserve, the University of Swaziland, B.J. Systems Corporation and Roy Littlejohn Associates, Inc.
Major Results Indicators: Indicators, baselines and targets for measuring success are being developed.
Baseline2/ Target3/
Increased commitments of resources TBD TBD (2000)
in critical regional development areas
by ESA missions.
PROGRAM: REDSO/ESA
TITLE AND NUMBER: Establish a Strong Basis for Implementation of the Greater Horn of Africa Initiative, 623-S003
STATUS: Continuing
PROPOSED OBLIGATION AND FUNDING SOURCE: FY 1997: $613,000 DFA
INITIAL OBLIGATION: FY 1995; ESTIMATED COMPLETION DATE: FY 2000
Purpose: To establish a strong basis for implementation of the Greater Horn of Africa Initiative (GHAI).
Background: In response to continuing crises in the Horn of Africa region, the Greater Horn of Africa Initiative was launched in 1995. USAID adopted the basic objectives of this Initiative as the guiding principles for developing a program of activities in the Greater Horn of Africa (GHA) region. The GHA region has been defined as including the following ten countries: Burundi, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Somalia, Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda. The GHAI acknowledges that food insecurity in the region is growing due to a complex and interrelated set of political, environmental, social and economic factors that can only be successfully dealt with on an integrated, regional basis through a participatory and collaborative process among: African states, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), concerned citizens, the bilateral and multilateral donor community, and regional organizations. By addressing the root causes of food insecurity and conflict, the GHAI will be critical to long-term sustainable development in the region. The Regional Economic Development and Services Office for East and Southern Africa, with its regional perspective and pool of skills critical to design and implementation of GHAI activities, has adopted the GHAI as one of its four strategic objectives. Nonetheless, since there are many resources and factors that will contribute to the achievement of GHAI objectives which are outside of the manageable interests of the USAID regional office.
USAID Role and Achievements to Date: The USAID regional office's role has been defined as coordinating the design of strategies and activities for the GHAI and facilitating their implementation. The purpose of the USAID regional office's involvement is therefore to contribute to the establishment of a strong basis for achieving the GHAI goal. In FY 1995, a strategic objective team, including GHAI partners and customers, was formed within the USAID regional office and has begun to function. The Horn of Africa Support Project (HASP) was designed and approved in FY 1995 to begin a regional process for establishing development priorities among the various development partners in the region and an agreement was signed with the Intergovernmental Authority on Drought and Development (IGADD), a regional organization located in Djibouti, to begin implementation of the first phase of this process.
Description: The GHAI involves a large number of development partners including several U.S. Government departments and agencies, USAID missions and U.S. embassies in the region, other donor agencies, governmental and regional organizations, NGOs and private voluntary organizations (PVOs), the private sector, and universities. the USAID regional office will assist in institutionalizing the process of joint problem solving to address the root causes of food insecurity and conflict in the GHA region.
Host Country and Other Donors: USAID is playing a leading role in engaging host country governments and other interested donors in the GHAI. The United States is the leading donor in the GHAI. Other major donors include Canada, the European Union, the Netherlands, Italy, and Japan. An informal donors forum had initial contact with national governments in the region. Regional institutions such as the IGADD are being strengthened to assist in facilitating the implementation of the GHAI activities.
Beneficiaries: It is anticipated that governments, NGOs and PVOs, and other local institutions and organizations will benefit initially from efforts under the GHAI. These benefits will eventually be reflected in the achievement of measurable results through the attainment of food security and conflict mitigation objectives.
Principal Contractors, Grantees, or Agencies: A grant agreement has been signed with the IGADD to fund the first tranche of activities under the HASP. However, in that USAID will implement the GHAI through a mixture of mission, U.S. Embassy, NGO, PVO, national, regional institutions and private sector entities, it is anticipated that a variety of U.S. and non-U.S. organizations and institutions will be used to provide required goods and services under the HASP and the GHAI in general. In FY 1997, the second tranche of funding will be provided to the HASP to further develop this process.
Major Results Indicators:
Baseline4/ Target5/
An increased numbers of partners and 1995 TBD (2000)
stakeholders represented at major GHAI (initial obligation)
policy/issue meetings and workshops
(by type of participant).
An increased quantity of GHA TBD TBD (2000)
governmental resources committed to
the achievement of GHAI objectives.
An increased quantity of donor resources TBD TBD (2000)
committed to the achievement of
GHAI objectives.
Purpose: To improve the effectiveness and timeliness of USAID's humanitarian assistance programs in east and southern Africa (ESA).
Background: Humanitarian assistance is both an act of national conscience and an investment in the future, and is integral to USAID's overall strategy to achieve sustainable development. In the ESA region, USAID is presently funding significant humanitarian programs in Angola, Burundi, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Mozambique, Rwanda, Somalia, Sudan and Tanzania. Funding totaled more than $549 million in FY 1995 (P.L. 480 Title II/III and Disaster Assistance funds). Years of experience in coordinating humanitarian assistance in the region motivated the Regional Economic Development and Services Office for East and Southern Africa's commitment to applying its expertise and resources to a strategic objective in the area of humanitarian assistance. There is a great need for a regional humanitarian assistance capacity to help the USAID missions in the region prepare for and respond effectively to crises, and for a regional approach that goes beyond the borders of individual countries. USAID's strategy is based on the conviction that, in order to break the cycle of continual humanitarian crises and to achieve the goal of sustainable development in the region, the strategy must deliberately facilitate the shift from relief to development. External constraints are always a risk when dealing with humanitarian crises. However, work on early warning systems and preparedness should enable the region increasingly to avoid such disasters.
USAID Role and Achievements to Date: The impact of USAID's humanitarian assistance is unquestioned: it has saved millions of lives and reduced the suffering of populations at risk; it has protected economic assets; it has built local capacity to prepare for and respond to disasters; it has facilitated a return to normalcy and local self-sufficiency in the aftermath of emergencies through effective rehabilitation; and it has helped affected populations return to the path of social and economic development over the longer term, through reconstruction and other development assistance programs. the USAID regional office has been instrumental in assisting missions in the region in resolving design and implementation issues for a variety of humanitarian assistance programs. Major humanitarian assistance programs where the USAID regional office is active include:
-- Southern Sudan: direct management responsibility for USAID emergency food and disaster relief programs;
-- Rwanda: USAID emergency food programs, but no direct management responsibility (includes Eastern Zaire, Western Tanzania, Burundi and Rwanda);
-- Angola: assistance in food needs assessments, transitional strategies and recommended USAID food levels for the coming year and beyond;
-- Malawi and Zambia: assessment of the impact of drought and U.S. responses;
-- Somalia: a probable increasing role in assisting in all aspects of USAID program;
-- Mozambique, Eritrea, and Ethiopia: assistance in the development of food security strategy; food management plans; and design of P.L. 480 Title III activities; and
-- Uganda: development of a USAID food management plan; monitoring of World Food Program (WFP) activities; and assistance in design and implementation of the P.L. 480 Title II monetization program.
Description: the USAID regional office will focus on three intermediate results: (1) improved preparedness in the east and southern Africa region for effective responses to crises; (2) more effective USAID responses to problems as they arise; and (3) enhanced target population capacity to re-establish their livelihoods following a crisis. Developing an improved preparedness capacity will be achieved mainly through implementation of the Famine Early Warning Systems III project. This project provides U.S. and host country decision makers throughout the region with up-to-date remote sensing data and accompanying analysis of agriculture, climatic and socio-economic conditions that may impact on regional food production and food security. To achieve a more effective USAID response to crises as they arise, the USAID regional office will continue to work closely within USAID and other implementing partners (private voluntary organizations [PVOs], United Nations agencies and other international organizations) to effect proper needs assessments, coordination, improved logistical systems, timely delivery of emergency supplies and food, and theestablishment and implementation of appropriate pragmatic monitoring systems. To enhance the target populations' capacity to restore their livelihoods following a crisis, appropriate assistance strategies will be developed and put in place following a crisis. It is anticipated that such a strategy will facilitate the initiation of rehabilitation and recovery activities that can be supported by the donor community.
Host Country and Other Donors: USAID coordinates with host country governments and with other donors to support effective humanitarian assistance interventions. Coordination and support by other donors, especially the European Union, is critical to the success of such emergency efforts. Through interaction with its main implementing partners, private voluntary agencies, United Nations agencies (World Food Program [WFP], United Nations Children's Fund [UNICEF], the United Nations High Commission for Refugees [UNHCR]), and international organizations (International Committee of the Red Cross and International Federation of the Red Cross), the USAID regional office continues to play an important proactive coordination and communication role critical to responding effectively to disasters and emergencies and maximizing its impact.
Beneficiaries: The main direct beneficiaries will continue to be the development partners that the USAID regional office works with to improve the effectiveness and timeliness of USAID's humanitarian assistance programs in east and southern Africa. However, the ultimate beneficiaries will continue to be the women and young children in the vulnerable groups that have been adversely impacted by both natural and man-made disasters.
Principal Contractors, Grantees, or Agencies: Most interventions are carried out by UN Agencies (UNICEF, UNHCR and WFP), international and indigenous NGOs, and international organizations such the ICRC and IFRC.
Major Results Indicators:.
Baseline6/ Target7/
An increased proportion of vulnerable
population provided with critical needs
to sustain life. TBD (1995) TBD (2000)
A percent decrease in the levels of acute
malnutrition in target populations. TBD (1995) TBD (2000)