Projects

Short Description:

Overall goal

Food-insecure populations affected by the crisis, including host communities, internally displaced persons and returnees, in all governorates, have access to life-saving food to meet their basic food needs all year round. The programme contributes to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 11 and 17.

Expected results

WFP’s Interim Country Strategic Plan (ICSP) in Syria aims at contributing to the following Strategic Outcomes:

1) Food-insecure populations affected by the crisis, including host communities, internally displaced persons and returnees, in all governorates, have access to life-saving food to meet their basic food needs all year round.

2) Food-insecure families in urban and rural areas affected by the crisis are enabled to meet their basic food and nutrition needs and increase their self-reliance throughout the year.

3) Nutritionally vulnerable groups, especially children and pregnant and lactating women and girls, across the Syrian Arab Republic have reduced levels of malnutrition throughout the year.

4) Humanitarian partners across the Syrian Arab Republic benefit from augmented logistics and emergency telecommunications capacity and services, enabling them to provide humanitarian assistance throughout the crisis. Worth noting, SO4 has not been considered in the Austrian funding proposal but has been shared to show the full breadth of WFP activities, in Syria.

Specifically, Strategic Outcome 1 has a dual objective of providing humanitarian food assistance to the most food-insecure women, men, girls and boys affected by the prolonged crisis in the Syrian Arab Republic and implementing school meal activities in areas hosting large numbers of internally displaced persons and with low food security and education indicators. Activities are focused on addressing the humanitarian needs of food-insecure Syrians affected by the prolonged crisis, including by using schools as a platform from which to reach hungry children and encouraging them to attend school, promoting stability, preventing the creation of a “lost generation” and addressing the urgent educational needs.

Target group / Beneficiaries

The contribution from Austria will enable WFP to assist 345,000 (175,950 female,

169,050 male) beneficiaries with General Food Assistance for one month:

Internally displaced persons: 186,300

Host communities: 69,000

IDP Returnees: 89,700

WFP in Syria operates its programmes with the support of 56 local cooperating partners located across the country. Each cooperating partner goes through a due diligence process before being contracted by WFP. WFP regularly provides training to cooperating partners in order to strengthen their capacity to perform.

Activities

- Provision of general food assistance in the form of regular in-kind or cash-based transfers (CBT) monthly food assistance with ready-to-eat rations in the initial phase of displacement;

- Provision of school meals for pre- and primary schoolchildren in regular schools and CBTs to out-of-school children enrolled in informal education or alternate learning opportunities;

Context

After a decade of continuous crisis, the humanitarian situation in Syria has since late 2019 deteriorated to levels not previously seen in Syria’s recent history. Fuelled by continued conflict, mass population displacement, the impacts of the financial crisis in neighbouring Lebanon and the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, Syria has since late 2019 seen an unprecedented economic downturn. Livelihoods have eroded as the cost of agricultural inputs have increased and income-generating opportunities have become scarce. WFP post-distribution monitoring data reveals that only 38 percent of surveyed households had acceptable levels of food consumption in 2020, a 31 percent decline from 2019. In parallel, the percentage of households with borderline and poor food consumption increased by 24 and 66 percent, respectively. Households across Syria continue to rely on negative coping strategies to cover their essential food needs. When looking at a disaggregated analysis of each coping strategy, data indicates that all coping strategies were used by the surveyed households almost equally. Based on the current situation and current trends, food insecurity is expected to expand to even broader swaths of the population going forward, while manifesting itself in ever deeper ways. The prospects for economic self-sufficiency among the crisis-affected population, significant livelihood recovery for the average Syrian household remains unlikely in the near term.