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Niger Country Program
Project / Program Summary

I. Basic data

Sector(s):
Title: Niger Country Programme
Donor country / organization: World Food Programme (WFP)
Other donors / organizations involved: Many UN, bilateral and NGOs
Beneficiary countries / regions: The Niger regions of Tillabéry, Tahoua, Maradi, Zinder and Diffa
Implementing agencies in beneficiary countries / regions: The Ministries of Planning, Agriculture, Education and Health in collaboration with bilateral organisations and NGOs
Duration: 4 years(1999 - 2002)
Starting Date: January 1999
Project / Program budget: US$28.9 million (48,117 MT of food commodities)
Finance / Type of cooperation: Grant/Food Aid

II. Project / program description

  1. Objectives
    To promote rural development notably by contributing to an increased food production, to increase school enrolment and attendance with a focus on the children of nomad families and with a particular objective of increasing the schooling rate of girls and finally to improve the health and nutrition status of women and small children.
  2. Activities / contents
    Support through FFW (food for work) for projects at village level which are receiving technical and material assistance from other agencies and which aim at combating desertification, improvement of the food production systems, water management and to diversify agricultural production.
    WFP food will be provided to school canteens to facilitate for nomad parents to keep their children at school. In order to encourage families to send their girls to school they will receive a special ration of cereals.
    Health centers, in areas which are particularly vulnerable to food insecurities, will be selected to utilise WFP food to attract women with small children to come for preventive consultations. Weaning food will be used to combat infant mortality and malnutrition.C. Expected outcomes / impacts
  3. Expected outcomes / impacts
    It is expected that the assistance will help augment the performance of the rural sector including advances in the fight against the degradation of the agro-ecological potential, the increase of agro-pastoral land, control of the water resources for productive purposes, in creased technical know-how in agriculture and the increased production of fodder and fire-wood production.
    In the field of primary education it is expected that the school enrolment rate will have passed well above 35 percent for both boys and girls in the under-privileged project zone.
    The assistance in the health/nutrition field is planned to contribute to the goals of the Government to decrease malnutrition in children under 5 years of age from 16.7 to 11 percent, decrease the proportion of children with low birth weight from 20 to 10 percent, reduce by a third the proportion of women with anaemia and to monitor the development of 80 percent of the children under 3 years of age living within 5 kilometers of a health centre.
  4. Features in line with the Agenda for Action
    All the activities described above are in line with the Agenda for Action areas of concentration since they are aimed at contributing to poverty alleviation through social and economic development and at improving the educational and health status of the poorest population groups.

III. Contact point:

WFP Africa Region Bureau (OSA)
Mr. M. Zejjari, Regional Director OSA
Mr. Tun Myat, Director RE 		Fax: 0039-06-6513-2839
Tel: 0039-06-6513-2201
Tel: 0039-06-6513-2009

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