WFP Regional Bureau for Asia and the Pacific - 2016 SPRs RBB 2016 SPRs by country | Page 778

Standard Project Report 2016
Furthermore, in line with the Multi-Sector Plan of Action for Nutrition (MSAPN) 2013–2016, WFP provided technical
assistance to the Ministry of Health to promote the importance of dietary diversity and food fortification through
various initiatives such as a landscape analysis for rice fortification, a pilot programme to assess the acceptability of
fortified rice, and awareness-raising sessions for groups of women and men in health centres. WFP also
collaborated with the Medical Research Institute (MRI) to carry out national nutrition surveys amongst PLW and
school-age children to establish baseline information to support better monitoring of the nutrition situation towards
2030. WFP worked closely with the Ministry of Health to review the national nutrition policy (2010–2017) to ensure
the inclusion of evidence-based and multi-sectoral responses to the high levels of acute malnutrition in Sri Lanka.
WFP provided technical and financial support to the Ministry of Health to revamp the existing but weak national
nutrition surveillance system to ensure timely information sharing and situation monitoring.
Through the school meals programme, WFP also provided technical assistance to the Ministry of Education by
supporting in the development of school data collection tools, such as questionnaires, to capture comprehensive
data on the school profiles. The school profiles, which included information on the number of students,
schools' physical and human resources, health and nutrition data, and other information, served as baseline
information for the Ministry of Education to identify areas required for improvement. The Ministry and WFP also
jointly conducted training sessions for national and local government officials for the roll out and completion of
questionnaires prior to the data collection phase of the study.
To strengthen the overall knowledge and capacity of the Government on school meals, a delegation composed of
three government officials from the Ministry of National Policies and Economic Affairs and the Ministry of Education
participated, with financial support from WFP, in the 2016 Global Child Nutrition Forum held in Yerevan, Armenia.
Strategic Objective: Reduce risk and enable people, communities and countries to meet their own food and
nutrition needs (SO3)
Outcome: Improved access to livelihood assets has contributed to enhanced resilience and reduced risks from
disaster and shocks faced by targeted food-insecure communities and households
Activity: Strengthening the resilience of vulnerable communities to reduce risk and impact of climatic shocks
Under component 3, WFP supported resilience-building through adaptation measures to improve the food security
of the climate shock-affected communities. Cash-based transfer adaptation activities were planned throughout the
year, although a significant gap in resources affected implementation. As a major mitigating measure, after
consultation with the Government, WFP prioritised highly vulnerable resettled communities in the Northern and
Eastern provinces during the first quarter of 2016 by using resources carried over from the protracted relief and
recovery operation (PRRO) 200452 that was concluded in 2015. The shorter implementation period and reduced
frequency of distributions (to one-off) given available funding meant that WFP utilised only 14.9 percent of the
planned funding while reaching 10,484 beneficiaries (43 percent of the planned beneficiaries).
As a result of a donation of USD 318,500 from the Alwaleed bin Talal Foundation, 397 participants were engaged in
resilience-building activities in December 2016, supporting 1,588 beneficiaries in total. Participants will receive
cash-based transfers in January 2017 and as such have been excluded from the 2016 beneficiary results.
Furthermore, with the confirmation of a three-year, USD 4 million contribution from the Korea International
Cooperation Agency (KOICA) in October 2016, this component’s activities will be scaled up in 2017 to cover the
Central, East, North and Uwa Provinces.
Going forward in 2017, the resilience-building and livelihood activities through food assistance for asset creation
using cash-based transfers will include: i) skills creation and vocational training for alternative income generating
activities; ii) seed funding to diversify income generating activities; iii) augmentation of water harvesting at the
households; iv) improvement of irrigation channels; and v) repair of water catchment facilities such as water tanks at
the community level. Access to water will continue to be enhanced through the rehabilitation and construction of
shallow wells, which will also support off-season production. Tools required for resilience building activities will also
continue to be provided by WFP. Broadly, the activities will support smallholder farmer production and allow
communities to meet household food needs and sell surplus at the local markets.
In preparation for the increased use of CBT through the CP, a market assessment covering 11 districts was carried
out in January 2016. In addition, WFP generated a cash feasibility map, which was generated in December 2016
based on information on road access, bank facilities, market locations and other factors. The results of
the assessment indicated that markets were fully functional and that accessibility had increased, with markets in the
project areas having a sufficient supply of food items. The assessment also found that CBT already implemented
during the year did not create price upsurges or shortages in the market. These results and lessons learned will
continue to be updated considering the 2016/2017 drought and will be used to inform WFP’s CBT design. They will
also be shared with all other humanitarian agencies for use when planning market-based programmes.
Sri Lanka, Democratic Socialist Republic of (LK)
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