Development Boy - A Parody Produced by Some Classmates

Much Needed Reform to Food Aid - We Hope

© Flickr: usaid.africa

What better way to end the month-long hiatus than by sharing the good new on food aid reform. According Politico, NYtimes and others, the Obama administration is expecting to announce a full transition to local procurement and cash vouchers. Instead of the sending containers full of US-grown commodities across the ocean, humanitarian and development organizations would soon be able to buy the food needed in regional and local markets.

Although I've written many times here and elsewhere about this, allow me to recap why I consider this a huge deal. First of all, our current system - in-kind food aid programs - is extremely inefficient and expensive. Most of the funding goes to pay for shipping and the food often takes months to arrive to its destination. In addition, the practice of selling food aid in local markets - monetization - can reduce local prices, leaving poor farmers worse off. The type of food is often not culturally adequate, and -with few exceptions-  it provides little nutritional value as it's mostly basic staples.

Local and regional procurement - the way WFP and other international donors do food aid - is much cheaper and efficient. Reporting for NPR's Morning Edition, Dan Charles interviewed Andrew Natsios (former USAID Administrator)  on the proposed changes to Food for Peace, the main program used to distribute food aid. According Natsios, when he first proposed the local procurement at one of the food aid conference in Kansas City, he was almost physically attacked. Virulent opposition coming from the shippers and some sector of the farm lobby prevented the reform from taking place.

I had the opportunity to visit one of the Kansas City Food Aid conferences few years ago while working for a small Nicaraguan NGO that relied on some USAID programs for its operations. The one thing that stuck in my mind was the shiny showcases the shippers used to allure contractors and NGOs into hiring their services when sending food aid across the ocean. I would later learn that close to half of our food aid budget goes to pay for these services.

Few stands from the shippers, my nostrils captured the smell of salmon coming from one of the corners. I followed my nose expecting a guy giving out delicious d'œuvres to find instead an Alaskan company sampling canned wild salmon used in food aid. While quite tasty, the cost of shipping these guys to places like Somalia, Ethiopia and Bangladesh takes up to 90% of the total tab American tax payers have to pay for the program.

Later in my career I had the honor to work with the USDA in a pilot program to replace in-kind food aid. Our proposal was one of the few in Latin America and the only one used to supply rural schools with fresh fruits, vegetables and dairy from nearby farmer cooperatives. I saw the tremendous impact programs like these can have in the communities where they are implemented. One of the farmer coops we worked with was able to expand its market to other costumers. In fact, a key factor behind the famous Brazil's Zero Hunger program was its local procurement for public schools, a model similar to the current proposal.

While we are all still waiting for the official announcement from the administration, I really hope this time we get it right. It wouldn't be the first time powerful lobbying groups and a handful of humanitarian organizations get away with maintaining our current broken system. I'll keep you all posted.

Sending Cash, Not Corn

My piece advocating for food aid reform and urging the congress to switch to local and regional procurement just got published by The Morningside Post. Check it out and let me know what you think.

The End of Groundhog Day? Reforming American Food Aid

Washington DC, Th  Dec 5^th, 2012  

At a conference organized by Farm Journal last Wednesday, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said that rural districts are losing their ability to exhort political pressure on their elected officials to maintain farm bill programs. This, and the fiscal cliff debate, is drastically changing the political climate of farm bill negotiations. After decades of fruitless criticism to the way the U.S. government distributes food aid globally, international development experts are finally seeing a real opportunity to incorporate long overdue changes to American food aid programs.

The United States remains one of the few countries that continue to ship food aid across the Atlantic instead of providing cash to purchase it close to where the food is needed, a practice common in Japan, the European Union and others donors. American food aid is expensive and ineffective. The Government Accountability Office estimates that approximately 60% of the program’s funds go to shipping. In addition, it can take up to six month for the food to reach its destination –too long to adequately address emergencies. 

Following the example of other countries, the Senate version of the farm bill introduced about $200 million to ‘local and regional food procurement’ or LRP. Instead of sending containers of corn and soybeans, LRP programs provide cash to the World Food Program and NGOs to purchase the food aid close to where is needed. Compare to our current program, LRP will save over 50% in shipping, and strengthen local farmers in the developing world by increasing the demand for their crops. 

The Senate’s effort, however, is currently threatened by a House version of the farm bill that rejects the LRP program. Understanding the reluctance of the House to embrace LRP to save money and make food aid more effective requires following the money and analyzing population trends. 

The farm bill covers a wide range of issues supported by countless lobbying groups. While liberals tend to favor food stamp and conservation programs, conservative groups exhort robust political pressure for farm subsidies and crop insurance programs.  Last year alone, ‘crop production and basic processing industry’ contributed to the House agricultural committee over $2.9 million, with 70% funneled to Republican congressmen. These contributions come from larger farmers and corporations that see no benefit in purchasing grains abroad. 

Opposition to the LRP also comes from rural Congressional districts where farming is still vital to their local economies. In contrast to the Senate, many House policymakers represent these constituencies which demand strong protection against climate variability and subsidized price support for their commodities. For the most part, these districts see little logic in using taxpayer monies to buy corn not in the Mid-West but somewhere in Kenya. 

“Why is it that we don't have a farm bill?” Vilsack said. "It isn't just the differences of policy. It's the fact that rural America with a shrinking population is becoming less and less relevant to the politics of this country.” According to the Department of Agriculture, over half of rural counties are seeing negative population growth in the past five years. As young people move to cities, farmers’ priorities are becoming less significant to policymakers.

While the issue of reforming the food aid has become a “Groundhog Day” among development circles, it seems that the fundamental changes in the political environment may allow the LRP to become law once for all. With the growing fiscal pressures the momentum is on the side of those opposing farm subsidies and supporting more efficient approaches to food aid.