June 7, 2012

NOUAKCHOTT, Mauritania/GENEVA – The figures speak for themselves. And so does the life of Beneitou Mint Bousnaval, 26, and mother of four.

The family of nine, including her husband's parents and his brother, live in Arafat, a department in the outskirts of the Mauritanian capital Nouakchott. Their tent is robust; the floor covered with a red carpet, in the corner, a small gas burner. This is where all of them stay, eat and sleep.

Bousnaval says they have nothing else, only the clothes they wear. The family barely eats one daily meal. She describes the situation as desperate. Her husband is unemployed but leaves home early every morning to try and find a job. In a good month, he manages to find work for ten days.

There is no money left for lunch for the two older boys, none to buy clothes.

Bousnaval's family is among the more than 15 million people in the Sahel region, the semi-arid belt from Senegal to Chad, who risk undernourishment, according to the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Africa Human Development Report 2012: Towards a Food Secure Future.

The report notes that while sub-Saharan Africa has recorded high rates of economic growth in recent years, including improvements in life expectancy and schooling, this has not resulted in better food security. More than 25 percent of the continent's 856 million people are undernourished.

In Mauritania, where an estimated 700,000 people–more than 20 percent of the population–are experiencing food shortages as a result of drought, The Lutheran World Federation (LWF) is providing over 5,000 vulnerable families with cash to purchase food for a six-month period beginning in June.

The project is a joint venture with the World Food Programme (WFP) and five other non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in Mauritania targeting a total of 11,500 households with an estimated 55,000 individuals.

"The food prices go up, bit by bit each day," says Bousnaval. In an effort to fight undernourishment, the government has opened low-price stores all over Nouakchott. "But the constant fights between the government stores and the neighboring merchants make it impossible to shop there," she explains.

Given to the Women Under the project, the families selected in nine urban and rural districts will each receive 15,000 Mauritanian Ouguiya (around USD 50) per month for six months. To ensure that the cash stays within the family, it is given to the women who buy food and other necessities, says Oumou Sow, monitoring and evaluations officer for LWF Mauritania.

"This is going to have a greater impact on people's lives compared to handing out food," says Sow. "With this kind of assistance, people will have the freedom to buy what they actually need and not get what others think they need," she adds.

Mohammed Jiddou works for the WFP in Nouakchott and is responsible for the cash transfer project. He says the implementation of the project is faster than distributing food from abroad, which takes at least three to four months between the control and distribution to beneficiaries.

Training and Evaluation The 5,000 households for which the LWF is responsible are organized into groups comprising four families each. Each group appoints a trustee, to whom the WFP issues a credit card and a mobile phone. All the trustees are trained and coached by LWF-appointed facilitators. The money involved is transferred from the donors directly to the selected bank.

"But along the way we have to evaluate every step in the process," says Sow. "Out of the 5,000 families in the project, 500 are appointed as reference families and given monthly evaluation forms. It is so important for us to know that the money ends up in the right hands and to the intended purposes," she adds.

The debit cards are refilled once a month and the trustee receives a phone message from the bank when the money is transferred. At the end of every month, the trustee and the LWF facilitator make a joint visit to the bank to withdraw the cash and distribute to beneficiaries.

Jiddou says the WFP uses the banking system to lower the risk of embezzlement and fraud. But, he adds, "There is always a risk involved when dealing with money." And as Sow points out, "there is also the risk about safety when the cash is handed over to the families." For Bousnaval, the project will make a huge difference in her family.

"This totally changes our life conditions. We will be able to buy rice, sugar, eggs, fish and even meat," she says. Her biggest worries are her children, being able to provide them with food and educate them. "For now I will be able to feed my children three times a day," she concludes.

The LWF's presence in the Islamic Republic of Mauritania began in 1974 through the Department for World Service (DWS), at the time responding to a humanitarian crisis caused by severe drought. Over the years, the focus has evolved to include development projects carried out in collaboration with local partners within the framework of the national poverty reduction policy.

The overall work currently promotes environmental protection, sustainable livelihoods, gender equity, peace, reconciliation and human rights, and gives support to people living with or affected by HIV and AIDS.

Lutheran World Information
Written for LWI by Thomas Ekelund in Nouakchott, Mauritania.