Despite Uganda’s fertile soil and favourable climate, five percent of rural households continue to experience food insecurity. This developing country registered increased literacy and life expectancy rates and a reduction in the number of people living in absolute poverty from 56 percent in 1992 to 38 percent in 2004. However, it ranked 144th out of 177 countries in the UNDP Human Development Index for 2005.
WFP supports the National Food Strategy through its Protracted Relief Recovery Operation 10121.1, which targets drought-affected people, refugees and nearly 1.5 million internally displaced people living in cramped camps to the north of the country. The programme, which runs until 2008, also assists displaced people when they return to their farms.
In addition, under a 2006-2010 country programme (10426.0), WFP supports the Uganda government's poverty eradication efforts by targeting areas assessed as Uganda's poorest and most food insecure – the North and Northeast.
Under the two categories, WFP assists through:
Relief food (Food for Life)
Resettlement rations
Primary school education (Food for Education)
Supplementary and therapeutic feeding (Food For Life)
Maternal child health and nutrition (Food For Health)
Agricultural and market support to small scale farmers
Creation of physical and human assets in post-conflict areas (Food For Assets) and
Vocational training for street children, as well as orphans and other people affected by HIV/AIDS (Food For Health)
The relief programme aims to provide life-saving assistance to the most vulnerable. The recovery and country programmes enable vulnerable people to secure food and income by themselves and eventually break out of the poverty trap and build their own sustainable livelihoods. In 2006, WFP will reach over 2.7 million people under the relief and recovery operation and more than 236,000 people under the country programme.
Overview
