MINUTES –NATIONAL FOOD SECURITY SECTOR MEETING
June2016
Monthly Food Security Sector (FSS) meeting was held on June1st2016in WFP Office. The meeting was attended by 11 partners, including 4 UN Agencies, 6 INGOs, and 1 National NGO. Representatives from OCHA, WFP, FAO, UNDP, Welthungerhilfe (WHH), Solidarites International, WCN, Plan International, ACTED and Myanmar Heart Development Organization (MHDO)attended the meeting.
The following Agenda was adopted for the meeting:
1. Review of previous meeting minutes/action points;
2. Coordination updates;
- Update on preparedness – mapping capacity/presence of partner organizations;
- Assessment Tools Tracking;
- HRP Q1 Reporting;
3. Early Recovery Network Presentation;
4. Updates from Cross cutting sectors (CWG)
5. AOB
- Review of Meeting Minutes and Action Points;
Minutes of the last meeting were reviewed for action points;
•FSS CC followed with the few focal points in the government to follow further on their plan for tackling the impact of El Nino in Myanmar. However, with the political transformation the focus of line ministries is to establish new administrative procedures and drawing government priorities. It will take some time for the line ministries to focus on these technical issues. Food Security Sector will follow this further whenever possible with agriculture department.
•The capacity and presence of FS Partners were recorded and Standard Operating Procedures (SOP’s) were revised for FSS, and intimated to ERPWG;
•Interactions were made with FSS partners on their available assessment tools and an update is included in the meeting agenda.
- Coordination Updates:
•Responding to the call on Presence Matrix, 12 organizations intimated their presence capacity and willingness to second their staff to any possible assessment in the aftermath of any disaster in coming monsoon season.
-All these organizations have their country offices at Yangon level; 8 of these organizations do have possible technical support from their regional offices and headquarters;
-8 organizations are present at Kachin/Shan, and Chin/Sagaing/Magway Regions; followed by Rakhine with the presence of 7 organizations, 5 organizations in Ayeyarwaddy and 2 organizations in Mandalay regions.
-ERPWG is collating from other cluster/sector; clean version will be available to partners for their perusal.
•Sectors/Clusters were reporting on the quarter one spanning from January to March in HRP 2016 to see the progress made against each indicator for benchmarking;
-Data shows that achievements against food assistance in terms of food and cash were quite satisfactory for the conflict affected targets in Rakhine and Kachin/Shan (>95%), while conditional food assistance in Floods reached 68% of the target;
-The coverage of Agriculture assistance was quite low in terms of achievements i.e. only 5% in Rakhine and 11% to the flood affected communities. Though funding remain an issue for the support of agricultural livelihoods, the period of reporting was not an active agriculture season as well.
-There is a request from Early Recovery Network (ERN) to accommodate non-agricultural livelihoods in the response of Food Security Sector. However, further discussions pending with adopting a more clear line of action on this aspect, further to the agreement of sector lead agencies, and FSS partners
•Following the tracking of assessment tools with partner organizations, response from 3 organizations highlighted the availability of Food Security Assessment tools with these organizations. Some of these tools have been tested in the situation of Myanmar.
•3 more organizations endorsed the effectiveness of such harmonized tool for food security sector, and offered technical capacity to be part of any further discussions;
•Quick analysis of these available tools suggest that;
-Food security/livelihoods are either the basic theme of such assessment tool or one of the important sector from multi-sector perspective.
-The food security indicators are resembling in these tools, but the set of questions posed are rather different.
-It emphasize the need of a harmonized tool, readily available to all FS partners for a unified understanding and interpretation as an added value in any emergency situation.
•Further discussions from meeting participants agreed to have further focused discussions from technical colleagues on this important issue, for further follow up and decisions.
Action Point:
-CC to follow with ERPWG for the final version of organization presence matrix;
-Focused discussions to be facilitated among technical colleagues on the development of Food Security Rapid Assessment tool, and the discussion will inform Food Security Sector on the outcome
-Updated contact directory of all organizations to be shared with FSS partners
3.Early Recovery Network:
The Inter-Agency Early Recovery Advisor was invited to the meeting, to facilitate clarity on the cross cutting theme of Early Recovery in food security response in Myanmar. Since number of natural disasters hit the country in the recent past, it not only increase the level of vulnerability among the people but there is significant differential on the remnant ER/reconstruction needs of these people.
The advisor facilitated a detailed presentation on the terminologies, basic concepts, importance, misconceptions, and the subsequent association of Food Security Sector with Early Recovery. Some of the main themes include;
-ER is part of Humanitarian response; and one of the 11 IASC cluster;
-ER is not a phase of emergency, rather a multi-dimensional approach and brings development perspectives in humanitarian response in order to catalyze sustainable development opportunities;
-ER in Food Security Sector emphasize on the restoration of agricultural activities, capacity building, and reducing dependency on food assistance;
-ER focused strategy for FSS should seek sustainability, reflect government priorities, enhance local capacities, promote gender equality and empower communities/institutions.
There were some discussions on understanding the scope of ER in conflict emergencies, especially during places of displacement. However, the needs of further discussions on sketching theearly recovery into the strategic framework food security sector was underlined. FSS and ERN will continue on his collaborating to recognize the achievements of ER in Food Security response and ways to translate in longer term vision of food security strategies.
Action Point:
-FSS and ERN to work closely on improving this understanding of ER in both complex and natural emergencies, and provide strategic directions as and whenever required by food security sector
4.Update from Cash Working Group:
•Dedicated Co-chair from WFP side joined the Cash Working Group, his contact details will be shared through CWG distribution list; CWG is scheduled to meet on 9th of June (invitation by CWG)
•The training workshop on inter-agency scoping mission on cash feasibility is completed, an action plan is agreed to complete the feasibility study in Myanmar.
Next Meeting: tentatively planned on29thof June 2016.
Annexure: Participant List
Name / Organization / Email / Contact #Hunter Michelsen / Trocaire / / 0996 0887327
Isabelle Boittin / ACTED /
Sebastian Glaeser / WCN / / 092543355053
Thurein / WHH / / 097 88709369
Soe Moe Kyaw / Plan Int. / / 09422486835
Saw Teddy / MHDO / / 095142164
Oo Soe Thant / Solidarites / / 09421764990
Stean Tshiband / UNDP/ERN / / 09788209369
SoiLang SENG / WFP /
Norwin Schafferrer / OCHA / / 09797007820
Khalid Khan / FSS / / 09453491124
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