A total of 129 localities were classified in an analysis of the food security situation in Sudan over the April - June 2015 period and in a projection for July - August 2015. Three states were not classified due to lack of information, these are: Gedaref, East and West Darfur. The both the current analysis and the projection range between Phases 1 and 3. The main livelihood systems are: pastoral and agro pastoral which are directly affected by good rainy season.
According to the analysis, there has been an improvement in food security situation in most of the localities compared with the last classification. The main reasons are: good food availability due to good rainy season and timely preparation for the agricultural practices. Moreover, prices of sorghum and millet have declined by almost 20 to 35 percent as newly harvested crops started to be available for household consumption. This enhances the access of food to vulnerable population who suffered from the last poor season, while the prices of other food items are still raising, which make access to those items somewhat difficult and adversely affect the dietary diversity. On the other hand the peace building initiatives and conflict resolution improved the security situation in some affected areas, such as Darfur.
In the projected period, the food security situation is expected to further improve in some areas Food security situation is improving due to abundant production of cereals and other food crops in the agricultural
season due to good rainfall and early preparation of farm practices, availability of inputs, expected improvement in animal conditions and production due to good pasture conditions. The continuous efforts in conflict resolutions in some of the affected areas are expected to improve the security situations and stabilize food supplies and livelihood conditions.
All the above positive changes have contributed to reduce the number of people in Crisis and Emergency phases. However, some areas still keep worsening, due to conflicts, insecurity and relatively higher prices.
Population Table for April - June 2015 period:
Population Table for July - August 2015 period:
The recommendations made by the Technical Working Groups at the end of the April - June 2015 analysis were the following:
Phase 1 and 2
- Building resilience to shocks and disasters through income - generating activities.
- Implement Water harvesting program.
- Increase the adult education to decrease the rate of illiteracy.
- Raise awareness between mothers by good practices.
- Implementation of the selective feeding program.
- Strengthening the information systems.
- Increasing livelihoods opportunities to sustain livelihood.
- Increase the capacity building to farmers and pastoralists.
- Distribution of food aid.
- Some measures are needed to control high trend of the cost of production.
- Review the food security plans to incorporate policies and control measures in the four dimensions of food security.
- Measures to improve the food supply chain for good application of food security concepts.
- Monitoring and evaluation system to follow up the implementation of these interventions.
Phase 3
- Enhance the peace building and conflict resolution.
- Increase the assistance to the vulnerable groups.
- Maintain the livelihood assets that lost by conflicts.
- Supporting the production means for small scale producers to enhance their production performance.
- Certain measure to maintain the high production costs for crops and animals.
- Ensure the availability of food through enhancing production and market structures.
- Distribution of essential vitamins for children and mothers to reduce the risk of malnutrition.
- Precaution measures for the risk of food prices hikes.
- Enhance the returnees and support their assets.
- Strengthening the monitoring and evaluation systems to monitor food security indicators.
- Awareness programmes on food cultures, nutrition and environmental reservation.
- Rehabilitation of infrastructures especially the feeding roads and marketing structures.
- Settle the animal routes, Improvement of rangelands and establishment of Animal health centers.
In the Projection for July - August 2016, the recommendations for next steps were:
- Establishment of Food Security Technical Secretariats at states as to handle and manage the IPC activities.
- Need for refreshment for level 11 training to cover all the states.
- Training on food security concepts, GIS, data management, SPSS and advances analysis programs is highly recommended.
- Availability of high quality data for better analysis and good results
- Stability of TWGs is highly needed for the sustainability of IPC activities.
- Awareness workshops for decision makers at states.
- Urge the availability of financial resources and logistics for the sustainability of the process.
- Restructuring of some working groups to fill the gaps
- Organize ISS training workshops at Darfur states.
- More application of IPC results for interventions.
- Projection analysis will follow this update shortly.
- Level II will be conducted at the remaining states in the coming period