WFP Regional Bureau for Asia and the Pacific - 2016 SPRs RBB 2016 SPRs by project type | Page 594

Standard Project Report 2016
Food and cash assistance was monitored by WFP field staff in accessible areas, and third party monitors or
programme assistance teams (PATs) in areas with restricted access. Joint monitoring of nutrition activities with the
United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) is planned, which will examine further the intra-family dynamics and
relevant aspects in relation to prevention of acute malnutrition.
Because access and insecurity is a challenge for WFP and at times also for partner organizations, WFP contracted
PATs to provide data collection and monitoring. WFP provided the PATs with an in-depth orientation and training,
including a detailed briefing on the operational and ethical standards of the United Nations Code of Conduct, to
ensure quality implementation.
The risks of third party monitoring were of primary concern for WFP, especially given issues around corruption, theft
and protection. For this reason, WFP carried out a robust partner screening and evaluation process that included
assessing their involvement with local authorities, oversight from the WFP compliance unit, and review of their legal
status and reputational issues.
Standardised reporting formats and checklists were developed for WFP staff, counterparts and PATs to collect and
consolidate output data and monitor the implementation of food assistance activities. The data collected
were aggregated at area office/sub-office level, allowing WFP programme officers to check on progress made
towards the achievement of results at the output level, such as number of beneficiaries reached and the amount of
food distributed.
In addition to this, WFP Afghanistan heavily invested in accountability systems, such as the creation of a beneficiary
complaint and feedback mechanism, whereby beneficiaries, partners, or anybody else can call the direct line to
provide confidential feedback, comments or complaints.
Results/Outcomes
In 2016, WFP provided life-saving food and cash-based transfers (CBT) assistance to 132,000 beneficiaries
including vulnerable undocumented returnees, conflict-affected internally displaced persons (IDPs), and Pakistani
refugees. Approximately, 2,400 children aged 6-59 months with moderate acute malnutrition (MAM) received
ready-to-use supplementary food (RUSF) and 5,300 pregnant and lactating women (PLW) received a mixed basket
of basic fortified foods. About 5 percent of life-saving assistance was provided through CBT.
Overall, WFP assisted more IDPs and fewer returnees than planned. This is because at the initial stage of the crisis,
returns declined in line with seasonal trends during winter, starting in December. The conflict battlegrounds moved
closer to the large districts and city centres, such as Kunduz, Helmand, Uruzgan and Farah, resulting in a huge
influx of IDPs, to which WFP responded.
Food assistance under this emergency operation was provided by borrowing available food stocks (3,740 mt of
assorted food items) from PRRO 200447, allowing WFP to meet the most urgent food needs.
Strategic Objective 1: Save lives and protect livelihoods in emergencies.
Outcome: Stabilised or improved food consumption over assistance period for targeted households and/or
individuals.
Activity: General distribution (GD).
The food consumption score is a proxy for household food security, using a combination of food diversity and
frequency weighted by the relative nutritional importance of different food groups. The results from post-distribution
monitoring (PDM) showed that on average, 19 percent of the households had poor food consumption, which was
worse than that of the base value (16 percent). The main reasons for this result are: i) the base value was
measured through PDM in December 2015 under the PRRO before the influx of IDPs and returnees; and, ii)
although the EMOP intervention period coincided with the second harvest season, many of the IDPs and returnees
lacked basic necessities when they arrived at the new or temporary settlements.
Given the short period of project implementation in 2016, follow-up monitoring of this indicator in 2017 could be
expected to reflect any changes in the food consumption score.
The household dietary diversity score is defined as the number of unique foods consumed (i.e. of different food
groups) by household members over a given period (typically the past 24 hours) and has been validated as a useful
approach for measuring household food access. The household dietary diversity score of 4.9 (as indicated in the
table on page 26-27) exceeded the target score of 4.5. Timely food assistance helped EMOP beneficiaries to
improve their dietary diversity. In addition, there was adequate diversity of available foods in the markets since
October and November were part of the second harvest season. Also most of the returnees were based in the
eastern region where there was availability of vegetables and other foods that contr