Food for Peace

 

 

Norwegian People’s Aid (NPA) was founded in 1939 as the labour movement’s solidarity organisation and embraces the values of solidarity, unity, equality and democracy as its guiding principles. For NPA, solidarity is based on mutual respect and common interests. The people themselves are in the best position to assess the best strategies and tactics in order to promote their own interests, welfare and security and a major component of all NPA work is to build capacity of individuals, organizations and institutions in order for people themselves to promote and protect their own interests with the aim of achieving sustainable development.

 

Norwegian People’s Aid first started working in South Sudan in 1986 with targeted provision of relief food and non-food aid.  The priority and strategy for many years was to provide humanitarian relief to the people of the South and to work closely with the authorities by way of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement. In 1993 an appeal was made to the main donor for relief food (USAID – FFP) to have a concurrent programme of supply of agricultural inputs and basic agricultural training to the same beneficiaries where possible. This would enable them to build their own crop production capacity and halt further need for relief food support.  For the Relief and Agriculture Programme this was a first step in having a consistent strategy supported by USAID (FFP and OFDA) and by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) that incorporated development initiatives that have become increasingly important as the conditions allowed the evolution of a Food Security and Rural Livelihoods Programme.

As the NPA South Sudan Program has developed and changed along with the changing situation in the South, there has remained a constant expression of solidarity with the people of South Sudan. This declaration was expressed in regular meetings with the Chairman of the SPLM (the late Dr. John Garang) and his senior colleagues by NPA staff in Sudan and Oslo, as NPA actively advocated for the cause of the South in various international and local fora. NPA also took the direct decision not to join the UN led Operation Lifeline Sudan (OLS) consortium, that had most of its work and access to areas decided through a tri-partite agreement between the UN, SPLM and crucially the Khartoum government.

By not joining the OLS, and having expressed practical solidarity with the people of the South, NPA was able to have very close relations with the authorities and people of South Sudan. This allowed updated security information and protection to be availed to NPA when bringing much needed humanitarian support to areas deemed “no go” by Khartoum and subsequently by the UN system. NPA were able to reach insecure areas and needy people with the support of the authorities despite any access embargoes imposed by Khartoum, or declarations of insecurity by the UN system. This was crucial for the main projects of the Food Security and Rural Livelihoods Programme as NPA was able to use its logistical abilities to bring much needed projects and services to remote and insecure areas.

The Food Security and Rural Livelihoods Programme was made up of 6 major projects: relief food distribution, agriculture, veterinary, emergency response – non food items, partners and repatriation. Other components have been facilitated on occasions during the years such as borehole drilling, road works and support to peace efforts, but these were the major projects over the bulk of the reporting period 2000 – 2007.

The overall goal of the Food Security and Rural Livelihoods Programme was “Contribute to the right of the rural poor communities of South Sudan to have improved livelihoods.” For the period 2000 – 2007, NPA with donor support from FFP, OFDA and MFA Norway, were able to manage an integrated package of appropriate interventions ranging from provision of relief food to targeted communities; basic agriculture support; and rural livelihood development in order to lead towards achievement of this goal. Additional projects were added on as the capacity and presence of NPA expanded based on the unique position of independence from the UN/OLS system.

The six projects within the Food Security and Rural Livelihoods Programme are integrated in their approach to contributing towards the overall goal. Resources such as personnel, logistical bases and administrative support were largely shared so that all projects could run in the most effective and efficient way and each project had its own objective contributing to the goal as follows:

Relief Food Distribution Project: “Critical food needs of the targeted rural poor populations that have poor access and entitlement to food from their own production, purchase or exchange are met.”

Agriculture Project: “Increased agricultural production for targeted households through adoption of improved techniques and technologies.”

Veterinary Project: “Improved animal production.”

Emergency Support – Non Food Items: “To make available urgently needed non food items to minimize livelihood distress.”

Partners Project: “To enable humanitarian interventions to expand to all areas of Upper Nile.”

Repatriation Project:  “To enable Bor IDPs to return home.” 

During the reporting period 2000 – 2007, the Food Security and Rural Livelihoods Programme grew to become a very large and complex Programme spread across many of the States of South Sudan. Over 60 staff were contracted centrally, with over 700 local contract staff. It was a major logistical operation that served the people of South Sudan during a critical period in their history from war into relative peace through the signing of the CPA.