A young girl cleans food at an internally displaced persons camp in Arare, 12 km from Jamame, Southern Somalia, December 2006.

© Manoocher Deghati/IRIN

On 30 March 2009, the European Commission approved an initial financing decision under a €1bn ‘Food Facility’ which was adopted at the end of last year by all European Union (EU) institutions and strongly backed by development NGOs. Overall over three years, the poorest in a total of 50 developing countries will benefit.

“Europe has already made humanitarian responses to the food crisis through emergency aid. The ‘Food Facility’ is the development response to get agriculture back on its feet”, said EU Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian Aid, Louis Michel in a statement on 30 March 2009.  On 18 December 2008, the European Parliament and Council of Ministers gave their green light to the proposal tabled by the European Commission in response to the 2007/2008 global food crisis which saw food prices soar. Three areas will be targeted under the three-year package (2009-2011):

• improved access to agricultural inputs like fertilisers and seeds and services such as vets and advisors;
• small-scale measures aimed at increasing agricultural production including microcredit, rural infrastructure, training and support to professional groups in the agricultural sector; and
• safety net measures, giving a source of income to vulnerable population groups, through working on labour-intensive public works projects (roads, irrigation etc).

The initial ACP beneficiaries under the Facility are: Burkina Faso, Burundi, Central African Republic, DR Congo, Cuba, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gambia, Guinea Bissau, Haiti, Kenya, Liberia, Mali, Mozambique, Sierra Leone and Zimbabwe. In this first instalment, all funding for ACP states will be channelled through International Organisations: the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), the World Food Programme (WFP), the World Bank (WB) and the UN Development Programme (UNDP).

Further allocations over the three years for other ACP nations (see box) will be made through a wider group of actors: International Organisations, Regional Organisations and national governments and also as calls for proposals by Non-States Actors, Member States’ bodies and other eligible actors, say EC officials.

Country Indicative Allocation ( in €M)

Benin: 12.9
Burkina Faso: 23.7
Burundi: 13.4
Central African Republic: 10
Comoros: 3.6
Cuba: 11.7
Democratic Republic of Congo: 40.6
Eritrea:12.8
Ethiopia: 45.4
Gambia:  5.5
Ghana: 20.9
Guinea Bissau: 8.4
Guinea: 13.5
Haiti: 15.8
Jamaica: 5.9
Kenya: 31.2
Lesotho: 6
Liberia: 10.9
Madagascar: 21.8
Malawi: 17.9
Mali: 22.1
Mauritania: 7.6
Mozambique: 23.2
Niger: 19.2
Rwanda: 15.6
Sao Tomé e Principe: 2.1
Senegal: 14.5
Sierra Leone: 16.2
Somalia: 14.4
Tanzania: 32.4
Togo: 13.7
Zambia: 16.3
Zimbabwe: 15.4

Source: EC Commission

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