El Salvador is the smallest and most densely populated country in Central America, with 294 inhabitants per/km2 and a population of 6.18 million (52.7% women, 47.3% men). It’s divided politically into 14 departments and 262 municipalities.
The country has an unequal distribution of wealth, displaying a GINI coefficient of 52.4 (meaning that the richest 10% of the population receives incomes 57 times higher than the poorest 10%). Poverty exists in pockets; six of the country’s 14 departments hold more than half of the households living in conditions of poverty; the EHPM National Survey 2010 showed that rural poverty was 43.2%; urban poverty 33.0%. Poverty affects vulnerable groups such as infants under 4 years (9.68%), adolescents and youths (24.22%) and the elderly over 65 years of age (6.8%).
Data from the 2010 Human Development Report showed El Salvador´s HDI at 0.659, ranking 90 out of 169 countries, a reduction of almost 10% since 2006; the Gender Inequality Index was 0.653, ranking 89 out of 138 countries placing it in a medium level of achievement, based on indicators related to labor force participation, education attainment, adolescent fertility and maternal mortality. All of this is aggravated by the country´s high vulnerability to recurring emergencies due to floods, landslides, earthquakes and tropical storms.
Since Hurricane Mitch in 1998, the country has suffered eight major disasters: two earthquakes (2001); a volcanic eruption and nine Tropical Storms, five of them within the last 24 months. According to the Regional Summary of the impact of Tropical Depression 12E by CEPAL/World Bank/IDB/UNDP/GFDRR (November, 2011) 12E affected more than 1.4 million people in October 2011. Total damages and losses amounted to more than US$333 million.
The country ranked No.1 in the world climate risk index issued by German Watch in 2009 and it is listed among the ten countries in the world that are most vulnerable to natural hazards (CRED/OFDA). More than 88% of the national territory is at risk, containing 95.4% of the total population. This is largely due to a high population density and decades of sustained environmental degradation and the effects of climate change which affects food and nutritional security too. High dependency on food imports and crop exports makes El Salvador very vulnerable to fluctuations in international prices of agricultural commodities.
The nutritional health of the population shows that national food and nutrition security have been at risk for some time. The FESAL Health Survey of 2008 indicates that 19% of children between 3 and 59 months of age have low height for their age. In the country 19.2% children under 5 are chronically undernourished; 40% children from 6 to 11 month have anemia (the main micronutrient deficiency) and 17.2% pregnant women suffer anemia at the end of pregnancy.
In this context, WFP El Salvador country strategy 2012-2016 has defined its vision: A country that is able to guarantee food and nutritional security for its people, in spite of natural and socioeconomic threats.
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