Sao Tome and Principe Country Strategic Plan (2019-2023)

CSP approved at EB.A/2019

Revision 01 approved by the CD on 11.08.2020

Revision 02 approved by the CD on 02.08.2021

Revision 03 approved by the CD on 12.05.2023

Sao Tome and Principe made significant progress towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals. Eradicating extreme poverty and hunger, however, remains one of the country’s biggest challenges.

The WFP country strategic plan for Sao Tome and Principe for 2019–2024 seeks to address some of the major food security and nutrition challenges and gaps identified by the national zero hunger strategic review and through consultations with the Government and other partners regarding food security, nutrition, school meals and smallholder agriculture.

As set out in the country’s development strategy, "Sao Tome and Principe Transformation Agenda 2030: The country we need to build", the Government aims to implement sustainable food security and nutrition programmes and policies autonomously by 2030 and has requested technical assistance from WFP in this endeavour. While school meals remain the central entry point for WFP, the country strategic plan is fully geared towards capacity strengthening – a strategic shift away from WFP’s operational role in past years.

The implementation of an innovative home-grown school meals programme in Sao Tome and Principe is expected to increase demand for locally produced nutritious foods and consequently stimulate national food value chains while minimizing environmental impact and facilitating equitable access to sustainable markets for smallholder farmers. Under this country strategic plan,

WFP’s activities will indirectly contribute to reducing malnutrition rates, empowering women and making progress towards gender equality.

The country strategic plan is designed to achieve the following strategic outcome:

• The Government of Sao Tome and Principe has strengthened capacity to implement an environmentally and socially sustainable, gender-transformative and smallholder-friendly home-grown school meals programme and related food security and nutrition policies and programmes nationwide by 2030.
• The strategic outcome will be achieved through two activities:
• Activity 1: Provide capacity strengthening (including through South–South cooperation) to the Government in the design, management and coordination of an environmentally and socially sustainable, gender-transformative and nutrition-sensitive home-grown school meals programme and related food security and nutrition policies and programmes.
• Activity 2: Provide capacity strengthening and coordination support to the Government in providing incentives for sustainable and equitable local food value chains and stimulating smallholder agricultural markets.

WFP is the Government’s partner of choice in its commitment to consolidate and improve the national school meals and health programme (Programa nacional de alimentação e saúde escolar), providing technical assistance and facilitating knowledge exchange for various aspects of the programme. WFP’s strategic position reflects its recognized experience and comparative advantage in the design of home-grown school meals approaches and smallholder agricultural market support programmes, such as Purchase for Progress and Purchase from Africans for Africa, knowledge exchange through South–South cooperation and its leadership in operationalizing these programmes.

This country strategic plan will be implemented in partnership with the Government of Sao Tome and Principe; United Nations agencies such as the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, the International Fund for Agricultural Development, the United Nations Children’s Fund, the World Health Organization and the United Nations Development Programme; the African Development Bank; Brazil; China; non-government organizations; and the National Institute for Gender Equality and Equity.

The country strategic plan is fully aligned with the recommendations of the zero hunger strategic review and with the Transformation Agenda 2030; the latter is also reflected in the United Nations development assistance framework for Sao Tome and Principe for 2017–2021. The plan contributes to WFP’s Strategic Goal 2, Strategic Objective 4 and Strategic Result 5.