WFP Regional Bureau for Asia and the Pacific - 2016 SPRs RBB 2016 SPRs by project type | Page 231

Standard Project Report 2016
nearly 250 health centres. Pregnant and lactating women (PLW) were not reached through the programme as
planned, as a result of the lack of available resources. The planned expansion of the MAM treatment programme to
other districts in the Central and Uva provinces did not take place for the same reason.
WFP carried out nutrition interventions in 249 of 264 planned health centres and 9,741 people whose children
participated in the treatment programme were exposed to nutrition messaging. Both female (94 percent) and male
(6 percent) caregivers received nutrition messaging, although the number of men reached was low since most of
the beneficiaries who visited the health centres were women. The lower proportion of men exposed to nutrition
messaging was also due to cultural practices whereby mothers often take a more active role in childcare, meaning
that children are often accompanied to health centres by their mother rather than their father. WFP will advocate in
future for fathers and husbands to also attend health and nutrition education sessions so that both men and women
can make an equal effort to address malnutrition at the household level.
Strategic Objective: Reduce undernutrition and break the intergenerational cycle of hunger (SO4)
Outcome: Increased equitable access to and utilisation of education
Activity: School meals programme for primary and secondary school children
Under component 2, the WFP-supported school meals programme (SMP) in the Northern Province reached the
targeted primary and secondary students of the 960 assisted schools with no resource or pipeline breaks. Outcome
indicators for the schools meals programme showed that the activity was a sturdy safety net since it provided
children with nutritious meals and contributed to continuous school attendance and retention rates for both boys and
girls (above 99 percent). The school meals provided were complemented by vegetables and condiments which
were purchased with the supplementary funds provided by the Government. The WFP-supported school meals fed
over 150,000 of the 160,000 planned primary and secondary students who attended schools in the five districts of
the Northern Province.
The WFP-supported school meals programme targeted only the Northern Province since its food and nutrition
insecurity levels were the highest in the country as a consequence of the 27-year long conflict which ended in May
2009, as well as recurrent natural disasters such as floods and droughts.
According to the school feeding outcome data collected in 2016, the average annual rate of change in the enrolment
of girls in secondary schools showed a slightly negative trend of minus 1.8 percent. This indicates a slight reduction
in the number of girls enrolled in secondary schools as compared to 2015. In order to better understand the
situation, WFP will work with the school authorities to investigate the potential reasons for this change. The country
office will also work to ensure that a gender-sensitive lens is incorporated and streamlined into the school meals
programme to capture any gender-related information.
Strategic Objective: Reduce undernutrition and break the intergenerational cycle of hunger (SO4)
Outcome: Ownership and capacity strengthened to reduce undernutrition and increase access to education at
regional, national and community levels
Activity: Strengthening the capacity of the Government through technical assistance
In an effort to support the Government to increase the supply of Thriposha to meet the requirements of the national
supplementary feeding programme to treat children with MAM, WFP provided technical support to the Government
on Thriposha composition and production. As a result, the production of Thriposha improved significantly from 2.7
mt/per hour to 5.4 mt/hour. The Thriposha factory enhanced its production capacity through the procurement of new
machinery using government funds, based on technical advice from WFP’s food technologist. Similarly, in line
with recommendations made by WFP, the Thriposha factory made an effort to improve the nutritional composition of
the product by revising the formulation of the fortification premix to meet World Health Organization
(WHO) standards for MAM treatment products. Because of the non-availability of complete data, the National
Capacity Index could not be calculated during the reporting year under this outcome.
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 community to reduce risk and impact of climatic shocks
Under component 3, there were significant resource delays and shortfalls, with USD 669,977 received out of a
planned USD 2,220,640, leaving a shortfall of 70 percent in funding for the component. Despite these
challenges, the resilience-building implemented during the year reached 10,484 people, over 40 percent of the
planned beneficiaries. Through consultation with targeted communities, activities were prioritised to focus on Jaffna,
Mannar, Trincomalee and Batticaloa as a result of resource gaps, enabling WFP to provide safety nets to the
Sri Lanka, Democratic Socialist Republic of (LK)
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