ENDING RURAL HUNGER

The case of Ethiopia

December 2017

www.endingruralhunger.org

Eyerusalem Siba and Biruk Tekle

 Eyerusalem Siba is a research fellow at the Africa Growth Initiative
at the Brookings Institution.*

Biruk Tekle is an independent researcher based in Ethiopia.

Acknowledgements
The Ethiopia Ending Rural Hunger case study has benefited from the insight of over 40 experts.
The author is grateful to the following stakeholders, among others, interviewed in Ethiopia in
August - October 2017: Khalid Bomba (ATA), Anne Margreth Bakilana (World Bank-Ethiopia), Han
Ulac Demirag (IFAD-Ethiopia), Edward Batte Sennoga (AfDB-Ethiopia), Adama Ekberg Coulibaly
(UNECA), Medhat Elhelepi (UNECA), Wakgari Alemu Sirika (Dan Church Aid), Daniel Abbott
(Save the Children), Selamawit Menkir (CARE-Ethiopia), Assefa Admasu (World Vision-Ethiopia),
Berhanu Lakew (Senior Economist DfID-Ethiopia), Tefera Demeke (MoFEC), Firehiywot
Handamo (MoFEC), Demeke Tsehay (NPC), Tadesse Bekele Fanta (National DRMC), Solomon
Eshetu (Ethiopian Public Health institute), Yigeremachew Seyoum (Ministry of Environment,
Forest and Climate Change), Mulatu Negassa (Disaster Risk and Early Warning System of the
Oromiya DRMC), Dawud Musa (Oromiya DRMC), Hailu Ankiso (MoANR) and Behailu
Shewangizaw (MoNAR), and Haileselassie Medihin (Environment and Climate Research Center).

Eyerusalem would like to express her gratitude to the experts at the Agricultural Transformation
Agency (ATA), the Environment and Climate Research Center (ECRC), United Nations Economic
Commission for Africa (UNECA) and the World Bank-Ethiopia office who participated in focus
groups discussions and validation exercises in August-October 2017.

*Corresponding author and a research fellow at the Africa Growth Initiative at the Brookings Institution. E-mail:
ESiba@brookings.edu.

1
Eyerusalem also wishes to thank Homi Kharas, John McArthur and Amadou Sy for invaluable
feedback on earlier version of the report; Amy Copley and Mariama Sow for excellent research
assistance and Belay Mulat for co-facilitating the field trip and research assistance; Christina
Kwauk and Sarah Baker for invaluable feedback on interview toolkits and Christina Golubski for
excellent editorial support.

Support letter from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ethiopia and the Embassy of Ethiopian in
Washington, D.C. is gratefully acknowledged.

The Brookings Institution is a nonprofit organization devoted to independent research and policy
solutions. Its mission is to conduct high-quality, independent research and, based on that
research, to provide innovative, practical recommendations for policymakers and the public. The
conclusions and recommendations of any Brookings publication are solely those of its author(s),
and do not reflect the views of the Institution, its management, or its other scholars.

Brookings gratefully acknowledges the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s support of the Ending
Rural Hunger project. Brookings recognizes that the value it provides is in its absolute commitment
to quality, independence, and impact. Activities supported by its donors reflect this commitment.

2
Contents
Abstract
Acronyms

1. Introduction ...................................................................................................................... 9
2 Mapping Ethiopia’s FNS needs, resources, and policy environment .............................. 14
The quest for FNS ........................................................................................................ 14
2.1 What are Ethiopia’s FNS needs?............................................................................. 17
2.2 Understanding FNS need heterogeneities for better policy targeting ....................... 19
2.3 Vulnerability to production, consumption, and environmental shocks ...................... 21
2.4 Agricultural Productivity Gap ................................................................................... 23
2.5 Ethiopia’s FNS policy environment: ERH ranking .................................................... 25
2.6 Ethiopia’s FNS resources: Unlocking the paradox ................................................... 26

3 Country strategy to achieve FNS ................................................................................... 28

3.1 Overview of country development strategy and planning process ........................... 28
3.2 Review of food and nutrition security strategy of Ethiopia under GTP I .................... 29
3.3 Performance and constraints of GTP I and outlook of GTP II .................................. 32
3.4 Resource allocation on FNS .................................................................................... 33

4 Programs and institutional innovations in Ethiopia’s quest for FNS ................................ 37

4.1 The Agricultural Growth Program ............................................................................ 37
4.2 The National Nutrition Program ............................................................................... 41
4.2.1 “Sekota” declaration: The epitome of commitment to nutrition security.............. 44
4.3 Resilience................................................................................................................ 46
4.3.1 The Ethiopian Productive Safety Net program .................................................. 46
4.3.2 The Climate Resilient Green Growth strategy (CRGE) ...................................... 52
4.3.3 Sustainable Land Management Program (SLMP) ............................................. 54

5 Financing FNS needs in Ethiopia ................................................................................... 56

5.1 Government efforts toward financing FNS in Ethiopia ............................................. 56
5.2 The role of international actors in financing FNS in Ethiopia .................................... 56

6 Conclusion and policy recommendations ....................................................................... 60

7 Appendix ....................................................................................................................... 63
8 References .................................................................................................................... 80

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List of figures

Figure 1: Agricultural labor productivity and FNS in Africa

Figure 2: Agricultural productivity and access to inputs in Africa
Figure 3. Enabling policy environment for agricultural productivity
Figure 4. Malnutrition in Ethiopia vs. regional average
Figure 5. Percent of households with low dietary diversity, by livelihood
Figure 6. ERH ranking on Ethiopia’s FNS-related policy environment
Figure 7. Ethiopia’s resource gap vs. the regional average
Figure 8. Planned government financing of development targets (GTP I)
Figure 9. Bilateral ODA commitment, by purpose, percentage of total (2009-2013 average)
Figure 10. Fund allocation by sector

List of tables
Table 1. Urban-rural distribution of food security and nutrition insecurity
Table 2. Distribution of adult and child malnutrition by wealth quintile
Table 3. Consumption and income volatility and rural safety nets in Ethiopia
Table 4. Access to productivity enhancing inputs in Ethiopia
Table 5. GTP targets for agriculture and rural development
Table 6. Resource mobilization
Table A1a: Food and nutrition security needs in Ethiopia
Table A1b: Enabling policy environment for agricultural productivity
Table A2: Regional distribution of rural food and nutrition insecurity in Ethiopia
Table A3: Regional distribution of child malnutrition in Ethiopia
Table A4: Selected targets of GTP I and II
Table A5: Mapping FNS-specific targets of GTP 1 with the Sustainable Development Goals and
Malabo Declaration

List of boxes
Box 1. Interview insights on the agriculture sector in Ethiopia: Challenges and ways forward
Box 2. Challenges in achieving nutrition security in Ethiopia: Insights from key interviews
Box 3: Interview insights on the Productivity Safety Net Program: Challenges and success stories
Box 4. Insights from interviews on disaster and reduction mitigation in Ethiopia: Challenges and
success stories

4
Abstract
Ethiopia’s nutrition needs emerge as some of the most severe in sub-Saharan Africa and are major
challenges to its achievement of Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 2: “End hunger, achieve
food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture.” Based on food and
nutrition security (FNS) data from the Brookings Ending Rural Hunger (ERH) project at Brookings
Institution and national sources, we find that improving Ethiopia’s state of FNS depends on three
priority areas. First, increasing access to food (through the reduction of extreme poverty, and the
expansion of coverage and adequacy of social safety nets), promoting the adoption of balanced
nutrition, and mobilizing resources for targeted FNS programming are key. Second, reducing
vulnerability to consumption and income shocks, while also mitigating their impacts through
income diversification and agricultural insurance are necessary. Third, building the productive
capacity of agriculture to sustainably address and maintain long-term food security is crucial.

5
Abbreviations and acronyms
ADLI Agricultural Development Led Industrialization
AfDB African Development Bank
AGOA African Growth and Opportunity Act
AGP Agricultural Growth Program
AGP-AMDe Agricultural Growth Program-Agri Business and Market Development
ATA Agricultural Transformation Agency
CAADP Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme
CASCAPE Capacity Building for Scaling up of Evidence-based Practices in
Agricultural Production in Ethiopia
CFSVA Comprehensive Food Security and Vulnerability Analysis
CHS Core Humanitarian Standard
CRGE Climate Resilient Green Economy
CSA Central Statistical Agency
DAG Development Assistance Group
DFID United Kingdoms’ Department for International Development
DHS Demographic and Health Survey
DRR Disaster Risk Reduction
ECRC Environment and Climate Research Center
EDF European Development Fund
EPHI Ethiopian Public Health Institute
ERH Ending Rural Hunger
FAO Food and Agriculture Organization
FDI Foreign Direct Investment
FNS Food and Nutrition Security
FTF Feed the Future
GTP Growth and Transformation Plan
HABP Household Asset Building Program
HCE Household Consumption and Expenditure Survey
IFAD International Fund for Agricultural Development
MAFAP Monitoring and Analyzing Food and Agricultural Policies
MDG Millennium Development Goals
MoANR Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources

6
MoE Ministry of Education
MoEFCC Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change
MoFEC Ministry of Finance and Economic Cooperation
MOH Ministry of Health
MoI Ministry of Industry
MoT Ministry of Trade
MoWCA Ministry of Women and Children’s Affairs
NDRMC National Disaster Risk Management Commission
NNP National Nutrition Program
NPC National Planning Commission
ODA Official Development Assistance
OECD Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development
OFSP Other Food Security Programs
PSNP Productive Safety Net Program
REDD Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation
SDG Sustainable Development Goals
SLMP Sustainable Land Management Program
TLU Tropical Livestock Unit
USAID United States Agency for International Development
WHO World Health Organization
WMS Welfare Monitoring Survey

7
1 Introduction

Recognizing the importance of food and nutrition security (FNS) for improving public health, labor
productivity and economic growth, African governments have expressed their commitment to end
hunger by signing the Malabo Declaration, under the auspices of the African Union (AU) in June
2014 as well as the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) at the United Nations Sustainable
Development Summit in September 2015. The Malabo Declaration aims to reduce childhood
malnutrition (under-five stunting to 10 percent and wasting to 5 percent)2 by 2025, and the SDGs
aim to end all forms of malnutrition—including those stated in the Malabo Declaration—by
ensuring access to sufficient and nutritious food for all people by 2030 (SDG2). In addition to the
above time-bound targets on FNS, these agendas also outline implementation strategies ranging
from poverty reduction to improving agricultural productivity to promoting resilient agricultural
practices.3

The global Ending Rural Hunger (ERH) database tracks countries’ progress towards achieving
SDG2 and ranks countries on FNS-related needs, policies, and resources, with the underlying
assumption that targeting countries with high needs but FNS-friendly policy environments
maximizes return on investments to ending hunger. Ethiopia is one of the six Africa case studies
the project covered along with Ghana, Nigeria, Senegal, Uganda, and Tanzania.

Using quantitative analysis backed with a review of national policy documents and interviews with
on-the-ground stakeholders, this report investigates where Ethiopia’s FNS needs are the highest,
examines whether resources and policies are aligned well to address those needs, and documents
the country’s implementation challenges to achieve national, regional, and global FNS-related
targets.

The analysis of the ERH database and other national statistics indicate that Ethiopia’s challenges
in achieving SDG2 by 2030 are remarkably great, as the country is one of the most food- and

2 Under-five stunting measures the percentage share of children under the age of five whose height-for-age is below
two standard deviations from the international reference population median (i.e., WHO Child Growth Standards median)
height of their age group. Similarly, under-five wasting measures the percentage share of children whose weight-for-
height is 2 standard deviations below the WHO Child Growth Standards median among children under five.
3 Specifically, the Malabo Declaration have the following targets: Sustaining agricultural growth at annual rate of 6

percent, halving poverty, doubling agricultural productivity and income, building resilience, and maintaining agricultural
spending target of 10 percent of public spending.

8
nutrition-insecure African countries, owing to the low productivity of its small-holder agriculture and
heightened vulnerabilities to climate and production shocks, including from droughts.

Using the ERH database, we found that:

1. The prevalence of undernourishment and malnourishment in Ethiopia are high even by

African standards, and Ethiopia ranks as one of the 10 most affected African countries in
terms of adult and childhood malnutrition rates as well as rural multidimensional poverty.
2. Agricultural production in Ethiopia is characterized by below average labor productivity and
volatile crop yield for cereals, which constitute 87 percent of the total grain production for
small-holder farmers and 73 percent for commercial farms (CSA, 2017).
3. Ethiopia ranks among the top 10 African countries for the extent to which government
documents fully recognize the importance of access to finance for farmers, equitable
management of water for agriculture, and general measures of rural investment climate.
4. However, actual coverage rates in road density, irrigation, and total renewable water
resources reveal that Ethiopia heavily depends on rain-fed agriculture, in the face of limited
renewable water resources and poor infrastructure coverage.
5. Furthermore, access to finance in rural areas is limited, and the total agricultural area
devoted to modern varieties of crops is below the sub-Saharan African average.
6. ERH’s ranking of political prioritization of FNS in public policy documents puts Ethiopia’s
nutrition policy as its top priority.4 At the same time, Ethiopia’s policy commitments on
agriculture, rural social assistance, women’s enabling environment, and research, skills,
and extension are identified as areas where gaps—relative to the regional averages and
global best practices—are the highest.
7. Both public and external resources play major roles in financing FNS in Ethiopia, with an
average resource per rural capita of $11 per year over the 2009-2013 period. Agricultural
foreign direct investment, however, is well below the regional average and plays a limited
role in financing FNS.

Ethiopia is indeed one of the high-need countries, notably when it comes to malnutrition and the
agricultural productivity gap, and is also resource constrained despite a relatively good policy

4 Political prioritization of agriculture is measured as the average of agricultural spending intensity as a share of
agricultural GDP, the degree to which citizens believe having “affordable and nutritious food” as priority in MyWorld
survey, and the extent to which national development plans and budget documents emphasize the role agriculture and
rural development play in poverty reduction and economic growth. Policy commitment to promoting balanced nutrition
is measured as the average of government’s efforts in adopting balanced nutrition guideline with time-bound nutrition
targets, promoting complementary feeding to children, and in attaining WHO recommended food safety measures.

9
environment for FNS. This finding led us to further probe the disconnect between these strong
policy commitments on one hand and high food and nutrition insecurity on the other, using a
qualitative analysis of national strategy documents and stakeholders’ engagement with over a
dozen on-the-ground governmental and non-governmental actors in Ethiopia.5 Our interviewees
almost unanimously agreed that FNS is a priority in Ethiopia and directed us to the national
development strategy and its programs, but (there is always a “but”), there are implementation
challenges, as discussed below.

Agriculture and rural development are indeed central to Ethiopia’s Growth and Transformation
Plans (GTP), which are development strategy documents implemented every five years, aiming,
among other objectives, to achieve food and nutrition security in the country.6 The GTP documents
of Ethiopia share many of the same goals and implementation strategies as the global FNS
strategy documents. The implementation strategies outlined in Ethiopia’s GTP documents include:
i) increasing agricultural income, production, and productivity; ii) reducing child malnutrition and
mortality; iii) building a climate-resilient economy; and iv) expanding social safety nets, among
other protection programs.

The country has put in place major programs to achieve the above goals. These include the
Agricultural Growth Program (AGP); the National Nutrition Program (NNP); Climate Resilient
Green Economy (CRGE), Sustainable Land Management Program (SLMP), and the Productive
Safety Net Program (PSNP), among others, to achieve its ambitious plan of making Ethiopia a
middle-income country with zero-added carbon emissions by 2025.

These programs are at varying levels of implementation and success: The AGP, which aims to
modernize the agricultural sector is in its second phase, as is the SLMP program, which primarily
aims to rehabilitate degraded areas and improve rural land administration. On the one hand, the
PSNP, one of the country’s large-scale social safety net programs with about 8 million
beneficiaries, has reached its fourth phase. On the other, the NNP and CRGE strategy are only at
the early stages of implementation, though launched in 2008 and 2011, respectively. The second
phase of NNP, launched in 2013, has undergone a number of revisions, and Ethiopia is set to

5 Over 40 food- and nutrition-related policy makers, experts and researchers from 18 governmental and non-
governmental organizations participated in the stakeholders’ engagement in the form of one-on-one interviews, focus
group discussion and seminars. See list of interviewed institutions in the appendix.

10
launch a new national nutrition policy to build on and address policy and implementation gaps of
the current NNP.

There have been a number of institutional restructurings to speed up the implementation of the
country’s major programs. The National Planning Commission (NPC) was established as an
autonomous federal government organ in 2013, with national mandate to harmonize national-level
plans, coordinate efforts to achieve sectoral targets, draft GTPs, track performance towards
national, regional, and global targets such as the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development
Programme (CAADP) and the SDGs. The former Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) has
been elevated to the ministerial level with a mandate to oversee the CRGE and the SLMP
programs. The National Disaster Risk Management Commission (NDRMC) is now an independent
organization directly accountable to office of the prime minister. Its performance in managing
recent droughts has been praised by national and international stakeholders.

There also are institutional innovations such as establishment of the Agricultural Transformation
Agency (ATA) mandated to oversee the country’s agricultural transformation agenda and to fill
strategy gaps. In addition, the NPC, which is mandated to strengthen Ethiopia’s long experience
on drafting strategies, to coordinate its national targets with the SDGs; and to closely work with
the donor community to achieve the GTP’s objectives, was also created. Finally, NGO clustering
efforts were created to address resource fragmentation and to enhance specialization of program
interventions. Core Humanitarian Standard (CHS) certifications—adopted by some of interviewed
stakeholders—is another instrument used to enhance quality and effectiveness of humanitarian
and development works and their accountability to people and communities they serve.

Field interviews indicate that the country’s FNS policy is also moving in the right direction, with
agricultural policies becoming nutrition sensitive and climate smart, and shifting from farm-based
interventions only to addressing constraints in the entire value chain, and strategy gaps being filled
out, notably in livestock sector. GTP II, spanning an implementation period of 2015/16-2019/20,
also places more emphasis on agro-industrial development, the commercialization of agriculture,
and the overall productivity of agriculture sector (AGP) while at the same time promoting inclusion
of small-holder farmers via better land management and safety net protections, as decreed in the
SLMP and PSNP.

However, major implementation challenges remain, notably the lack of attention to detail,
insufficient emphasis on the action plans of grand strategies, and poor horizontal coordination to
jointly plan for and implement programs involving multi-sectoral coordination. The latter is

11
especially notable in the NNP and disaster-risk reduction and management. The nutrition program,
though it involves nine ministries, the intervention areas of sectors other than agriculture and
health, is not well-defined and remains unclear to the signatory ministries, according to
interviewees. Similarly, the NDRMC’s effort to mainstream risk mitigation in day-to-day planning
of around 11 ministries is challenging. Getting the attention of other participating institutions at
times when there is no disaster is reported to be difficult. The CRGE is also one of the programs
that lacks details on action plans and the indicators to gauge and track performance, even in the
GTP II document.

While institutional restructuring often empowers catalytic institutions, addressing the human
capital and financial constraints of public implementing institutions, as well as their incentive
structure, should equally be given due attention. Unless such constraints are tackled, scaling up
innovative, often better funded, programs at national level will prove difficult.

Other more general challenges and opportunities in attracting development finance for agriculture
and nutrition persist. First, the federal structure does not reach lower administrative levels in some
regions. This limits local implementation capacity and impairs the sustainability of interventions. In
addition, even when the federal structure is present at the local level, resources are thinly sliced
among implementation units. Second, global competition for external resources, low FDI
conversion rates in agricultural sector (despite various investment incentives provided for
investors in the sector), macroeconomic challenges (such as inflation), and lack of export
diversification all contribute to resource constraints. By contrast, new export opportunities exist for
agribusiness as part of Ethiopia’s push for industrial parks and export promotion. In addition, the
drive to boost private investment (under the G-20’s Compact with Africa initiative) offers potential
as well.

With all the policy actions on the ground, the fact that Ethiopia is one of the worst-affected countries
by malnutrition in the region speaks volumes about its remaining journey in achieving FNS. Even
when achieving food security, which is a journey in itself considering climate risks, remaining
pockets of food insecure and more-so nutrition insecure regions in the country will persist. Closing
socio-economic, gender, and regional inequalities in access to food and in productive resources;
addressing vulnerability to shocks, and filling in policy and implementation gaps are among the
country’s remaining challenges. Notably, Ethiopia needs to intensively address the policy and
implementation gap of its nutrition strategy and tackle the challenge of mainstreaming nutrition
and risk mitigation in other sectoral strategies. The interview insights clearly indicate where the

12
implementation gaps are pressing; it is our hope that this report creates the platform for various
stakeholders to listen to each other’s concerns.

The remainder of this report is outlined as follows. Chapter 2 reviews the spatial, socioeconomic,
and demographic distribution of food and nutrition insecurity in Ethiopia. Chapter 3 analyzes
national development plans, the policy environment, and the government’s priorities and
resources for addressing FNS needs. Chapter 4 presents Ethiopia’s major FNS programs and
insights from interviews with on-the-ground stakeholders. Chapter 5 analyzes FNS financing in
Ethiopia, while the final section concludes with policy recommendations.

13
2 Mapping Ethiopia’s FNS needs, resources, and policy
environment

The quest for FNS

Cross-country comparisons of food and nutrition insecurity, poverty, and agricultural productivity
in Africa7, as seen in Figure 1, support the focus, given in global, regional, and national strategies,
on reducing extreme poverty and building the resilience and productive capacity of farmers as key
instruments to address food and nutrition insecurity in Africa. Countries with high agricultural labor
productivity have better access to food (as measured by lower rates of rural poverty and lack of
money to buy food), and, unsurprisingly then, a lower prevalence of undernourishment and child
malnutrition (such as under-five stunting). Ethiopia belongs to the group of countries with below-
average performance in agricultural labor productivity and food and nutrition security. Thus,
improving agricultural productivity is essential to the country’s success in achieving SDG2.

Figure 1: Agricultural labor productivity and FNS in Africa

70%
64%
61%
60%

50% 47%
39% 37%
40%
30%
30% 26%

20%
14%
10% 8% 8%

0%
Undernourishment Under-5 stunting Under-5 wasting Rural poverty Residents who have
headcount ratio experienced "lack of
enough money to buy
food"

Ag. value added per worker < average Ag. value added per worker>=average

Source: Own calculations based on ERH database.

Comparisons of agricultural productivity among African countries reveal the importance of access
to key agricultural inputs and enabling policy environments. As can be seen in Figures 2 and 3,
countries with higher agricultural productivity (measured by cereal yield) tend to have relatively

7 Africa refers to all 46 African countries covered by the Ending Rural Hunger database. For a complete list, visit
https://endingruralhunger.org/.

14
better access to key agricultural inputs—such as finance for rural farmers, fertilizer, trade- and
transport-related infrastructure, and arable land equipped for irrigation (Figure 2). In addition, they
rank higher in their policy commitments to strengthening agricultural productivity such as through
enabling access to rural finance, land, water, extension services, and agricultural input markets
(Figure 3). These comparisons suggest that some of these factors can be binding constraints to
agricultural productivity.

Figure 2: Agricultural productivity and access to inputs in Africa

Arable land equipped for Road density

irrigation 3

Km of road per 100 sq km of land

12%
2.5
10%
2
8%
1.5
6% area
1
4%
0.5
2%
0
0% Cereal Cereal
Cereal yield<average Cereal yield>=average yield<average yield>=average

Access to financing for farmers Time to export

1.6 40
1.4 35
1.2 30
Discrete (o-4)

1 25
Days

0.8 20
0.6 15
10
0.4
5
0.2
0
0 Cereal Cereal
Cereal yield<average Cereal yield<average yield>=average
yield>=average

15
 Figure 2 (continued)

Distance to fertilizer index Logistics performance index

transport
10000 2.4
2.35
9500 2.3

Discrete (1-5)
2.25
9000
Index

2.2
8500 2.15
2.1
8000 2.05
2
7500 1.95
Cereal Cereal Cereal Cereal
yield<average yield>=average yield<average yield>=average

Source: Own calculations based on ERH database

Figure 3. Enabling policy environment for agricultural productivity

3.41
Enabling conditions for rural financial services
3.99

3.42
Access to land
3.71

3.99
Access to agricultural input markets
3.53

3.47
Access to water for agriculture
3.84

3.69
Access to agricultural extension services
3.93

0.00 0.50 1.00 1.50 2.00 2.50 3.00 3.50 4.00 4.50
Discrete: 1-6

Cereal yield<average Cereal yield>=average

Source: Own calculations based on ERH database.

16
2.1 What are Ethiopia’s FNS needs?
Ethiopia’s challenges in achieving SDG2 by 2030 are remarkably great, as the country is one of
the most food and nutrition insecure African countries (Figure 4). The prevalence of
undernourishment and malnourishment are high even by African standards, and Ethiopia ranks
as one of the 10 most-affected African countries in terms of the rural multidimensional poverty
headcount.

Figure 4. Malnutrition in Ethiopia vs. regional average

Rural multidimensional poverty 96%

headcount 69%

Rural poverty rate 38%

51%

Children affected by anemia 51%

60%

Under-5 stunting 44%

35%

Under-5 wasting 10%

8%
Percentage of household with
"poor" household consumption 36%
34%
score

Percent of calories from staples 76%

62%

Undernourishment 35%
20%

0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%

Ethiopia Regional average

Source: Own calculations based on ERH database.

According to the ERH report, 35 percent of the population in Ethiopia is exposed to the risk of
undernourishment due to insufficient food consumption to meet daily energy requirements—
compared to the African average of 20 percent. Lack of dietary diversity is common, as can be
seen from higher dependence on staple foods, lower protein consumption, and a higher share of
the population that falls into the “poor” food consumption score (FCS) category.8 According to

8 The FCS score is a measure of the frequency of consumption of different food groups consumed by a household
during the seven days before the survey. The indicator measures the percentage of the national population that falls
into a “poor” FCS score category and “borderline” category.

17
ERH’s ranking of food security needs over the period 2009-2013, Ethiopia ranks 102 (out of 115
countries) and 90 (out of 109 countries for which data was available) in calorie gap and dietary
diversity, respectively, indicating that these should be two of the highest priority areas to accelerate
the country’s efforts to achieve SDG2. In relation to the other African countries in the sample,
Ethiopia is among the bottom 10 countries in four of the six measures of calorie gap and dietary
diversity (Table A1a in the appendix).

Various factors contribute to the high prevalence of food and nutrition insecurity in the country. For
example, in Ethiopia, 42 percent of respondents to a Gallup World Poll reported that they have
experienced a lack of enough money to buy food during the past 12 months prior to the survey
period. In addition, 38 percent of Ethiopia’s rural population lives under the $1.25 a day poverty
line. When taking health, education, and other dimensions of living standards into account, nearly
all (96 percent) of the rural population live with multiple deprivations (Figure 4). Unsurprisingly,
then, Ethiopia ranks among the 10 countries in sub-Saharan Africa with the highest rates of
multidimensional poverty.

Looking at national child malnutrition rates, under-five stunting and anemia in children are the two
most prevalent forms of childhood malnutrition in Africa. Not only does Ethiopia belong to the 10
lowest-performing countries in sub-Saharan Africa in under-five stunting and wasting but one in
every two children under the age of five is also affected by anemia.9 Indeed, Ethiopia’s rates of
stunting and anemia in children are beyond the global critical threshold (40 percent) outlined by
the WHO. Various studies have shown that the costs associated with childhood malnutrition are
very high and the consequences are long term if left unchecked. The good news is that trends of
child malnutrition rates in Ethiopia have showed marked progress over the past 15 years.
According to recent DHS report, the prevalence of stunting and underweight children decreased
by 20 percentage points (from 58 percent to 38 percent) and 17 percentage points (from 41 percent
to 24 percent) between 2000 and 2016, respectively. Ethiopia also reached the MDG target for
under-five mortality (68 per 1000 live births) one year prior to 2015, though the target of reaching
MDG goal of reducing prevalence rate of underweight children to 14 percent was not achieved
(WHO, 2014; DHS, 2017). Ethiopia also suffers from micronutrient deficiencies such as in zinc,
vitamin A, and iodine, which the WHO deems public health problems. Fifty-two and 34 percent of
women of reproductive age are iodine and zinc deficient, respectively (EPHI, 2016).

9Another problematic area of childhood malnutrition in Ethiopia is being underweight (weight-for-age). According to
DHS (2011), 29 percent of children score two standard deviations below the average weight for their age.

18
2.2 Understanding FNS need heterogeneities for better policy targeting
Understanding the spatial and socio-economic characteristics of the populations most affected by
food and nutrition insecurity not only facilitates targeting, it also guides the nature of policy
interventions required to achieve SDG2. To this end, we present the demographic, socioeconomic,
and spatial composition of the populations most affected by food and nutrition insecurity in
Ethiopia.

Table 1 compares food consumption and dietary diversity measures among various groups of
households by place of residence and gender using the 2011 Ethiopian Demographic and Health
Survey (DHS). Comparisons among rural and urban households reveal that rural households
consume higher calories per adult equivalent per day on average, but suffer from lower dietary
diversity.10 Rural areas also have a significantly higher proportion of households with low access
to food (i.e., those falling below absolute poverty line and belonging into the lowest quintile of
expenditure per capita) compared to their urban counterparts, suggesting that focusing on food
and nutrition insecurity in rural areas should be a particular priority.

Table 1. Urban-rural distribution of food security and nutrition

insecurity

Indicator Unit Rural Urban

Mean kilocalories per adult equivalent per day 3164 2985
Diet quantity Consumption < 2550 kcal / adult equivalent /
40% 42%
day (% of households)

>75% of total household calories coming from

58% 20%
starch staples (% of households)
Diet quality
Low dietary diversity (<=3 food groups over 7
34% 16%
days) (% of households)
Food consumption Poor or borderline food consumption (% of
29% 17%
adequacy households)
Height-for-age (stunting, % below 2 SD) 46.2% 31.5%
Weight-for-height (wasting, % below 2 SD) 10.2% 5.7%
Child malnutrition
Weight-for-age (underweight, % below 2 SD) 30.4% 16.3%
Any anemia (<11.0 g/dl) 45.4% 35.2%
Women (%<17) 9.7% 7.2%

10Rural Ethiopia has larger proportion of households obtaining more than 75 percent of total household calorie
consumption from starch staples (58 vs 20 percent), and higher proportion of households consuming fewer than three
food groups over seven days (34 vs 16 percent).

19
 BMI<17 (moderately
Men (%<17) 14.8% 10.9%
and severely thin)
Below absolute poverty line (% of households) 24% 19%

65% or more of total expenditures on food (%

14% 5%
Economic vulnerability of households)

Lowest total expenditures per capita quintile (%

24% 4%
of households)
Source: CFSVA 2014, DHS (2011).

As seen in Figure 5, sources of livelihood matter for households’ state of food security. Food-
producing households, constituting 91 percent of rural households covered in the 2011 Household
Consumption and Expenditure (HCE) and Welfare Monitoring Surveys (WMS), are less likely to
consume diversified foods than non-food-producing households. This has to do with the fact that
most food producers are subsistence farmers and pastoralists whereas traders and salary workers
are more likely to be net buyers of food, with the option of buying different types, and to have
steady income. Thus, more stable and diversified sources of livelihoods often provide better food
security.

Figure 5. Percent of households with low dietary diversity, by livelihood

Livestock 54%

Other 37%

Crop & livestock 34%

Crop production 31%

Total 30%

Casual labor/daily laborer 28%

Manufacturing, construction, & mining 28%

Remittances 28%

Wholesale & retail trade, formal 21%

Service trade 19%

Wholesale & retail trade, informal 13%

Salary 12%

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60%

Percent of households

Source: HCE and WMS, 2011.

20
 The regional distribution of rural food and nutrition insecurity (see Table A2 in the Appendix)
indicates that the Tigray, Amhara, and Somali regions have above-average shares of rural
households consuming less than 2550 kcal per day and facing low dietary diversity. Moreover, the
prevalence rate of under-five stunting is higher than the global critical threshold for two (Tigray
and Amhara) of the three aforementioned regions (Table A3). A high prevalence rate of anemia in
children is common across all the regions of the country, and, even in the regions performing well,
still hovers near the critical threshold. Both adult and child malnutrition rates in Ethiopia decline
with wealth, indicating that greater household incomes are linked to better access to food and
dietary diversity (Table 2).

Table 2. Distribution of adult and child malnutrition by wealth quintile

Height-for-age Weight-for- Weight-for-age

Wealth Starch Low dietary (stunting, % height (wasting, (underweight,
quintile staples (%)* diversity (%) ** below 2 SD) % below 2 SD) % below 2 SD)
Lowest 66 53 49.2 12.1 35.6
Second 62 40 47.7 12.3 33.2
Middle 55 27 45.6 9.4 28.8
Fourth 46 17 45 7.7 25.8
Highest 21 12 29.7 5.1 15.1
Total 50 30 44.4 9.7 28.7
Source: DHS (2011). * Measures percentage share of households that have more than 75 percent of total calories
coming from starch staples. ** Measures percentage share of households consuming fewer than three food groups
over 7 days.

2.3 Vulnerability to production, consumption, and environmental shocks

In settings where subsistence, small-holder farming is the dominant form of food production, both
market- and production-related shocks threaten rural households’ access to and supply of food,
depending on their excess demand or supply of food. Net buyers of food suffer limited access to
food during high price seasons. Net sellers of food, on the other hand, will be affected by
income/livelihood shocks when prices of their produce are low and when market- and climate-
related shocks adversely affect production. According to the latest agriculture sampling survey
report of Ethiopia, small-holder farmers produced 95 percent of the country’s total grain output in
the 2016/17 cropping seasons (CSA, 2017) and sold just 15 percent of their agricultural produce
on average, making subsistence farming the dominant form of agricultural livelihood in rural
Ethiopia (CSA, 2017).

Table 3 shows that Ethiopia ranks among the 10 most vulnerable countries to food price shocks
in sub-Saharan Africa due to a combination of the high share of food expenditure within household

21
 budgets and high (domestic) food price volatility. According to the DHS (2011) report, 14 percent
of rural households spend more than 65 percent of their household income on food expenditures
(Table 1). Imported food price volatility adds to domestic food price instability. As 2017 comes to
a close, food prices have declined. The drop was driven by the decline in dairy prices. Moreover,
the FAO predicts that, in 2018, cereal production, such as rice and coarse grains, and inventory
levels will reach record highs due to an expansion in production in South America and Southern
Africa.11

Table 3. Consumption and income volatility and rural safety nets in

Ethiopia

Sub-Saharan
Regional Global Africa
Indicators Unit Ethiopia average ranking comparison
Consumption and income shocks
Household exposure to food Index
564.32 500.79 58 Bottom 10
price shocks
(% share of
non-farm
income in total
Income diversification 7.4
income of rural
farm
households)
Rural safety nets
Number of food safety net
1 0.95 48
programs
Social safety net coverage Percent 17.74 26.13 60
Productivity and production shocks
Agricultural TFP growth Percent
2.11 1.22 45
(1961-2010)
Agricultural value added per Constant 2005
5.51 6.54 100
worker USD, logged
Cereal yield kg per hectare 1948 1485 65
Variation in cereal crop yields Tons per
0.25 0.21 89
hectare
Source: Own calculations based on ERH database.

Furthermore, production shocks prompted by extreme weather events also contribute to vulnerability
among farmers in Ethiopia. For example, in August 2017, the Ethiopian government and its
humanitarian partners published a report indicating that 8.5 million people will require emergency food

11 See: FAO, “FAO Food Price Index eases in October as dairy prices decline” November 2, 2-17. Available at
http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/1053495/icode/

22
assistance because of the poor performance of the spring belg rains in many parts of the country.12
Analysis of long-term climate trends indicates that annual rainfall has declined slightly since the mid-
1990s—although regional variation exists (WFP, 2014). Projections suggest that temperatures will
steadily rise over the next several decades and both droughts and flooding will increase (Mahoo et
al., 2013). Additionally, population pressures could increasingly degrade and constrain land and water
resources, exposing more people to disasters and adversely affecting their ability to meet their food
and nutrition requirements, according to Ethiopia’s National Meteorological Agency (NMA, 2007).

These uncertainties, especially in light of climate change, underscore the need to invest in
consumption-smoothing mechanisms, such as rural safety nets, and income-smoothing
mechanisms, such as agricultural crop insurance, income diversification,13 commodity exchange
markets (to enable farmers to track food price trends so they stock when prices are low and sell when
they are high), as well as encourage a culture of saving—which will equally require promoting formal
and informal banking institutions. Food and social safety net programs in Ethiopia do not adequately
cover the needs of even the poorest of the poor. As can be seen from Table 3, just 17.7 percent of
the poorest 20 percent of the rural population is currently participating in social assistance programs.
Safety net programs also primarily target food insecure households to prevent asset depletion and
bridge food shortages during off-farming seasons. Thus, Ethiopia needs to look beyond these
insurance mechanisms and build the productive capacity of agriculture to achieve a diversified rural
economy in the long term.

2.4 Agricultural Productivity Gap

As seen in Table 3, agricultural production in Ethiopia is also characterized by low average labor
productivity and volatile crop yield for cereal production, which constituted 87 percent of the total
grain production for small-holder farmers and 73 percent for commercial farms during the 2016/2017
production year, respectively (CSA, 2017).

Agricultural productivity figures in Table 3 indicate that, despite its above-average growth
performance in total factor productivity (TFP) over the 1961-2010 period, Ethiopian cereal yield is
volatile, and labor productivity in the sector is below the regional average (even lower than the

12 See Joint Government and Humanitarian Partners’ 2017 Ethiopia Humanitarian Requirements Document (Mid-Year
Review): https://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/ethiopia_humanitarian_requirements_document_mid-
year_review_2017.pdf.
13 According to the FAO (2012), just 7.4 percent of income of rural farm households comes from non-agricultural

wages and self-employment in 2012, indicating low income diversification. See: Food and Agriculture Organization,
“Agricultural Development Economics,” 2012. Available at: http://www.fao.org/economic/esa/esa-activities/esa-small-
holders/dataportrait/constraints/en/.

23
bottom 25th percentile of productivity distribution in Africa).14 Since labor productivity is often a
strong predictor of living standards of workers, as more productive farmers tend to have higher take-
home income that they can spend on food consumption and other household expenditures, these
trends are concerning.

Various factors seem to limit the productive capacity of Ethiopian farmers, including limited access
to finance, infrastructure (with road density of just 3 km for an area of 100 sq. km), agricultural
technology (i.e., area devoted to modern varieties and irrigation),15 and few qualified agricultural
researchers (Table 4).16 In addition, high dependence on rain-fed agriculture in the face of limited
renewable water resources subjects the country to production and environmental shocks. Ethiopia
also performs below average in access to trade-related infrastructure (measured by the number of
days it takes to export and a general measure of the quality of trade and transport logistics). It is
important to address these trade barriers to increase income (through improved access to wider
markets) and improve productivity (through increased competition and exposure to global
productivity-enhancing best practices).

Table 4. Access to productivity enhancing inputs in Ethiopia

Sub-Saharan
Regional Global Africa
Key input indicators Ethiopia average ranking comparison
Access to financing for farmers 1 1.125 51
Road density 3.0 8.50 110 Bottom 10

Distance to fertilizer index 7653.3 9085.7 67

Arable land equipped for irrigation 1.95 7.49 92

Total renewable water resources per
1330 13061 92 Bottom 10
capita
Percent of area devoted to modern
13.69 21.35 21
varieties
Share of researchers with PhD 2.2e-06 .0000132 48
Share of female researchers 2.3e-06 9.99e-06 42

14 Notably, interviewed respondents from the Agricultural Transformation Agency, contended that findings from the ERH
database underestimate the performance of the agriculture sector by focusing too heavily on crop farming and
overlooking contributions from the livestock sector.
15 Another ERH indicator on science and technology looks at agricultural R&D expenditure as a percent of agricultural

GDP. Under that indicator, we see that, in Ethiopia 0.2 percent of Agricultural GDP is dedicated to R&D, against 0.7
percent in sub-Saharan Africa.
16 The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa, an organization founded amid Kofi Annan’s call for an African “Green

Revolution” was created in 2006 through a Gates Foundation and Rockefeller partnership. The group has funded 14
PhDs in Plant Breeding, 3 PhDs in agronomy, 37 MScs in Crop Science and 12 MScs in soil science, in the aim to
improve research output.

24
 Time to export 45.4 30.98 98 Bottom 10
Logistic performance 1.995 2.20 98 Bottom 10
Source: Own calculations based on ERH database.

2.5 Ethiopia’s FNS policy environment: ERH ranking

Ethiopia ranks among the top 10 African countries in terms of the extent to which government
documents fully recognize the importance of access to finance for farmers, equitable management
of water for agriculture, and general measures of the rural investment climate (see Table A1b. in
the Appendix).

ERH’s ranking of political prioritization of FNS in public policy documents puts Ethiopia’s nutrition
policy as its top priority. At the same time, Ethiopia’s policy commitments on agriculture, rural
social assistance, women’s enabling environment, and research, skills, and extension are
identified as areas where gaps—relative to the regional averages and global best practices—are
the highest (Figure 6).

Despite agriculture’s purported prioritization in policy documents, the country’s agricultural

performance remains weak along a number of dimensions. Notably, actual coverage rates in
irrigation indicate that Ethiopian agriculture is still heavily dependent on rain-fed agriculture in the
face of limited renewable water resources. Moreover, poor infrastructure (notably road density)
also constrains access to local and international markets for agricultural products and inputs.
Furthermore, access to finance in rural areas is limited, and the total agricultural area devoted to
modern varieties of crops is below the sub-Saharan African average (Table 4).

Figure 6. ERH ranking on Ethiopia’s FNS-related policy environment

Source: ERH database.

25
2.6 Ethiopia’s FNS resources: Unlocking the paradox
ERH’s ranking of resources (local and external) allocated to addressing food and nutrition security
needs reveals that Ethiopia’s government spending on agriculture is far below the regional
average ($10.60 per rural capital compared to $33.36). While about the same amount ($10.73) is
spent using official development assistance (ODA), Ethiopia’s reliance on traditional aid funding
is actually slightly higher than the region’s (Figure 7). Compared to the regional average, FDI is
by far the most under-exploited source of funding in the sector.

Given the high share of foreign resources in FNS financing, it seems that resource constraints and
resource mobilization are among the major challenges of FNS financing efforts of Ethiopian
government. Beyond these resource gaps, on-the-ground implementation challenges,
misallocation of resources, and low adoption rates of nutrition guidelines and agricultural best
practices can potentially explain the disconnect between relatively strong policy commitments on
one hand and limited access to key agricultural inputs and high food and nutrition insecurity on
the other. As further discussed in Chapter 4, many of the interviewed stakeholders, for instance,
stated their concerns regarding the implementation of the existing policies. Despite strong policy
scores, the country has significant strides to make in implementing policies across levels of
government, especially when coordinating with implementing bodies in lower levels of
government. Additionally, stakeholders from the National Planning Commission stated that the low
level of awareness of FNS issues and existing accountability gaps on the implementers’ side are
also challenges.

26
 Figure 7. Ethiopia’s resource gap vs. the regional average

NGO

Philanthropy

FDI to agriculture

ODA to FNS

Government spending on agriculture

0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40
2005 USD/rural capita

Ethiopia Regional average

Source: Own calculations based on ERH database.

27
3 Country strategy to achieve FNS
3.1 Overview of country development strategy and planning process
Ethiopia adopted its Agricultural Development Led Industrialization (ADLI) strategy in the early
1990s. The philosophy of the ADLI is that agricultural development plays a leading role in
industrialization by improving productivity of small-holder agriculture and by creating linkages with
the industrial sector. Since then, a number of five-year development strategy documents have
been drafted and implemented within the ADLI framework, Ethiopia’s Growth and Transformation
Plans (GTP) being the latest of such documents. Reflecting the country’s stage of development,
the first GTP (GTP I), from 2010-2015, focused on agriculture and rural development as engines
of economic growth while GTP II aims to achieve structural transformation and promote economic
diversification by supporting export-oriented industries with strong linkages to agriculture.

Spanning an implementation period of 2015/16-2019/20, GTP II aims to speed up industrialization,

achieve structural transformation, and promote economic diversification by supporting export-
oriented industries (such as garments, leather, and footwear) that have strong linkages with
agriculture through the expansion of agro-industrial parks.17 According to the GTP II document,
agriculture will continue to be an engine of growth in the economy during its implementation period.
Promoting productivity in staple crops, high-value crops, export commodities, and irrigation-based
agriculture will remain a priority, with an added emphasis on addressing constraints such as
agricultural marketing system failures, to facilitate collaboration between small-holder farmers and
the private sector.

In 2013, the government established the National Planning Commission (NPC)—formerly a

branch of Ministry of Finance and Economic Cooperation (MoFEC)—as an independent
organization dedicated to producing national development plans, aligning national plans with
international commitments, and coordinating sectoral targets. To prepare the GTP documents,
sectors submit their plans to the NPC, which are then compiled into the national GTP. The NPC
monitors progress on these plans and provides solutions when policy and implementation gaps
arise.

The draft GTP II documents, along with the progress and implementation challenges of and
lessons drawn from GTP I, were presented by the NPC at various consultative meetings with
development partners and civil society and then adopted by the government in May 2016. GTP II

17To this end, 7 million square meters of land is planned to be allocated for expansion of four pilot agro-industrial
parks under GTP II period (GTP II, page 29).

28
serves as a blueprint for development cooperation and coordination of interventions between the
government of Ethiopia and various non-governmental stakeholders. The MoFEC also uses GTP
targets as a basis for budget allocations across sectors and regions.

The NPC is also mandated to coordinate the national plan with global targets such as the SDGs.18
In 2017, the NPC performed a voluntary national review to evaluate the alignment of Ethiopia’s
development targets with and progress toward achieving the SDGs. It found that the pro-poor and
pro-growth policies, strategies, plans, and programs, as well as the climate resilient green
economy strategy do indicate the country’s strong commitment to implementing the SDGs. It
further notes that agriculture and health extension programs have been effectively implemented—
suggesting some successful early progress on these targets of the SDGs—although climate
change-induced drought poses significant challenges to human development objectives in the
country.

3.2 Review of food and nutrition security strategy of Ethiopia under GTP I (2009/10-
2014/15)
Maintaining rapid and equitable economic growth and achieving the MDGs were the main
objectives of the development strategy of GTP I.19 In line with the country’s overall development
strategy, one of the main strategic pillars of GTP I was to maintain the agricultural sector as a
major source of economic growth while creating conditions for industry to play a key role in the
economy. Attaining the MDG goals of the social sectors such as education and health was given
special emphasis in GTP I documents.20

The development goals were also linked to specific measurable targets and implementation
strategies for the main productive sectors of the economy. The targets for agriculture and rural
development, health, and infrastructure reveal the priorities of the Ethiopian government towards
FNS, whereas its overall performance reflects its constraints. The implementation strategies
related to food security included increasing agricultural income, production, and productivity;
reducing poverty, child malnutrition, and child mortality; and building a climate-resilient economy
and social safety nets, among others. Notably, given that GTP I was created to align closely with
the MDGs—the precursor to the SDGs—GTP I also aligns closely with the SDGs on several
targets, with which it briefly overlapped in 2015. For example, the aforementioned implementation

18 Meanwhile, sectors mainstream sector-specific regional targets such as CAADP.

19 Attaining MDG goals of the social sectors such as education and health was given special emphasis in GTP I
documents. See Table A4 for selected macroeconomic and sectoral targets of GTP I.
20 Investments in infrastructure and social programming (such as the promotion of gender and youth empowerment)

also belong to the list of strategic pillars to attain rapid and equitable economic growth.

29
strategies are similarly mentioned in the targets of Goals 1, 2, 3, 6, 8, and 13 of the SDGs, in
addition to the Malabo Declaration objectives as essential to addressing food and nutrition
security.21

Increasing production and productivity of small-holder farmers and pastoralists was one of the
implementation strategies of GTP I to achieve food and nutrition security. For instance, the plan
aimed to increase the productivity of the crop and livestock sectors by increasing the supply of key
agricultural inputs (such as cultivable land, modern seeds, fertilizer, and improved animal breeds
and fodder), improving plant and animal health, and scaling up agricultural best practices (through
improvement in utilization of extension services and enhancing the skills of agricultural
researchers) (GTP I, pages 20-21). These objectives correspond with the SDG goal of doubling
agricultural productivity among small-holder farmers and the Malabo Declaration targets of
sustaining agricultural GDP growth of at least 6 percent and accelerating agricultural growth by at
least doubling current agricultural productivity by 2025.

Increasing the income of agricultural households through greater involvement of the private sector
in production as well as the exporting of high-value agricultural products (such as horticultural
goods, cotton, coffee, and spices) is another strategy for achieving food security, as outlined in
GTP I. To this end, the government adopted the Universal Rural Road Access program, which
resulted in a significant increase in road density, a reduction in the average time it takes to reach
the nearest all-weather roads, and promotion of agro-processing industries with strong backward
linkages to agriculture.22 This GTP I strategy also relates to SDG2, which targets include an
increase in investment in rural infrastructure, as well as the Malabo Declaration targets that strive
to drive promote sustainable and reliable production and boost investment in markets and trade
infrastructure, both of which depend on suitable road infrastructure.

Moreover, decreasing the percent of the population living below the poverty line and ensuring food
security at the household level through increasing the coverage of farmers benefiting from safety
net and household credit programs are other strategies that the GTP I outlines. These strategies
correspond with SDG1, which calls for an end to poverty, and SDG8, which focuses on inclusive
growth and employment opportunities. Furthermore, the Malabo Declaration promotes inclusive
agricultural development by calling for countries to ensure that at least 50 percent of agricultural

21 See Table A5 for food and nutrition security-specific targets of GTP I and how they overlap with the regional and
global targets set by the Malabo declaration and SDG2.
22 As seen in Table A4, total road length grew to almost 2.5 times its level in 2009 and average time it takes to reach an

all-weather road declined by almost a half from its baseline level

30
growth contributes to the overall poverty reduction target. It also calls for African countries to
support women and youth interested in economic opportunities in agri-business.

Building resilience to environmental shocks and expanding social safety nets are integral parts of
the plan for achieving sustainable rural development. Thus, GTP I also marked the adoption of the
Climate Resilience Strategy. The government’s efforts to increase preparedness for and
responses to environmental shocks range from investments in small-, medium-, and large-scale
irrigation development to strengthening natural resource and bio-diversity conservation to the
uptake of climate change adaptation and mitigation technology. SDG2 similarly calls for the
implementation of resilient agricultural practices that increase productivity and production, that
help maintain ecosystems, that strengthen capacity for adaptation to climate change, extreme
weather, drought, flooding, and other disasters, and that progressively improve land and soil
quality by 2030. SDG6 goes further, calling on countries to “ensure availability and sustainable
management of water and sanitation for all”. The Malabo Declaration also highlights water
management systems as crucial to natural resource conservation. It strives to enhance
investments for resilience-building initiatives (including social security for rural workers and other
vulnerable social groups, as well as for vulnerable ecosystems); mainstream resilience and risk
management in policies, strategies, and investment plans; and ensure that, by the year 2025, at
least 30 percent of African farm, pastoral, and fisher households are resilient to climate change
and weather-related risks.

Finally, GTP I outlines disaster mitigation and management strategies to reduce vulnerability
to shocks. Risk preparedness mechanisms include risk profiling of woredas23 in an effort to
enhance systems of early warning through woreda networks, and increasing food and non-food
reserves and contingency budgets. Efforts to ensure household-level food security during a
disaster include a population resettlement program and productive safety net programs coupled
with family-level credit packages in order to build household assets and increase incomes of food-
insecure households. Ultimately, the intention is to ensure graduation from the safety net program.
Similarly, in response to climate-related disasters, the Malabo Declaration calls for strengthening
strategic food and cash reserves to respond to food shortages occasioned by periodic prolonged
droughts or other disasters/emergencies; strengthening early warning systems to facilitate
advanced and proactive responses to disasters and emergencies with food and nutrition security
implications; and targeting priority geographic areas and community groups for intervention.

23 The kebele is the smallest administrative unit in Ethiopia, while the woreda is the next largest, formed by a collection
of kebeles.

31
 SDG13 also aims to strengthen resilience and adaptive capacity to climate-related hazards and
natural disasters in all countries.

Other sectors closely related to FNS such as health and infrastructure are also included in the
plan. Implementation strategies in health include improving maternal health and longevity as well
as reducing child malnutrition and mortality by ensuring improved health service delivery. These
GTP targets correspond with SDG3 (“end preventable deaths of newborns and children under 5
years of age”) as well as the Malabo objective of reducing child mortality. Implementation
strategies in the infrastructure sector include increasing the construction of roads, power, and
communication services as well as improving the quality of and access to safe drinking water and
sanitation services.

3.3 Performance and constraints of GTP I and outlook of GTP II

Table 5 tracks the progress of Ethiopia towards some of GTP I’s targets specific to agriculture and
rural development. The country’s performance has been mixed. For example, Ethiopia achieved
and surpassed the targets regarding the annual growth rate of the agricultural sector and its allied
activities, land rehabilitation, and community-based water shed programs.24 However, it did not
achieve those for cereal productivity and production of cash crops, such as the one for coffee by
2014/15. This is also true for the supply of key agricultural inputs such as improved seeds and
chemical fertilizers, as well as the area of land developed under small-scale irrigation.

Table A4 in the Appendix tracks the performance of additional targets on economic growth and
sectoral targets related to infrastructure and health. As noted above, the country also witnessed
marked progress on the coverage and accessibility of road infrastructure (the total length of roads
as a share of total road network and the average time it takes to reach all-weather roads),
surpassing the GTP I targets. However, the performance on road density and proportion of roads
in acceptable condition indicators points out that additional investment is needed to keep up with
the growing demand for infrastructure due to population growth and the need to invest in the quality
and maintenance of road infrastructure. Coverage rates of electricity and telecommunications
(mobile and fixed lines) also fell short of the targets, with higher degree of success on the latter.

Performance in the health sector is also mixed. While Ethiopia attained the target of reducing under-
five mortality rates from 101 to 68 deaths per 1,000 live births, targets set for infant and maternal

24 Graduation from the PNSP safety net program, however, has proven challenging (GTP II, page 8).

32
 mortality rates, births attended by skilled health professionals, and rates of stunting and wasting
were not fully attained by the end of GTP I period.

Table 5. GTP targets for agriculture and rural development

Plan Five-year Plan

Unit of Baseline targets Actual growth targets
Description of targets measurement 2009/10 2014/15 2014/15 performance 2019/20
Economic development
Agriculture and allied
Percent 7.6 8.7 9.60 26.3% 8
activities growth
Crop production and productivity
Quintals per
Cereals productivity 17 22 19.5 14.7% 30.9
hectare
Thousands of
Coffee production 341 831 548.2 60.8% 1,102.6
tons
Agricultural input supply and utilization
Millions of
Supply of improved seeds 0.56 3.6 1.87 233.9% 3.56
quintals
Supply of chemical
fertilizers (both DAP and
Millions of tons 0.83 1.66 1.2 44.6% 2.06
Urea)

Natural resource conservation and utilization

Millions of
Area of land rehabilitated 3.21 10.21 11.7 264.5% 22.5
hectares
Land developed under
community based water Millions of
3.77 7.78 12.16 222.5% 41.35
shade development hectares
program
Land developed under
Millions of
small scale irrigation 0.853 1.85 1.3 52.4% 1.7
hectares

Food security, disaster prevention, and preparedness

Food reserve Millions of tons 0.41 3 0.405 -1.2% 3

Source: Own calculations based on GTP I and GTP II documents.

3.4 Resource allocation on FNS

In addition to the above-mentioned sectoral targets, budgetary allocation of government expenditure
provides insight into the priority given to agriculture and rural development in general, and food and

33
nutrition security in particular in Ethiopia. The financing strategy of GTP I presented in Figure 8
reveals the government’s plan to increase spending to poverty-oriented sectors over the GTP I
implementation period (2009-2014), indicating continued priority given to FNS, conditional on
successful resource mobilization.

Figure 8. Planned government financing of development targets

(GTP I)

25% 23.6%
22.5%
21.6%
20.5%
20%

15%
12.6%

9.8%
10% 8.5%

6.4% 6.8% 5.9%

5%

0%
Agriculture & food Education Health Roads Water
security

2009 2014

Source: Own calculations based on allocation of the total expenditure for financing sectoral targets of GTP I (GTP I,
page, 41).

While commitment and priority to FNS do not seem to lag on the part of national policymakers, a
lot can be improved in regard to the government’s resource mobilization strategy. Though tax
revenue as a share of GDP increased and reached 13 percent of GDP by 2014/15, it is below the
GTP target of 15 percent and the sub-Saharan African average (Table 6). The success of external
resource mobilization through export promotion underperformed too due to a drop in international
commodity prices of Ethiopia’s major export items (such as coffee and gold) and limited volume
and diversification of exported products, according to the GTP I document.

34
 For GTP II, implementation strategies similar to the ones in GTP I are adopted for the period
2015/16-2019/20, with ambition of the targets adjusted according to the above mentioned internal
and external challenges the country experienced during GTP I (Table 5). To this end, GTP II aims
to improve tax revenue mobilization as well as utilize the opportunities in the international market
(such as the renewal of African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) and the EU’s “everything-
but-arms” initiative) to increase the share of exports in GDP to 20.6 percent by 2019/20 (Table 6).

Table 6. Resource mobilization

Plan Five-year Plan
Unit of Baseline target Actual growth targets
Indicator measurement 2009/10 2014/15 2014/15 performance 2019/20
The macroeconomy
Real GDP growth rate Percent 10.4 11.4 11.4 9.6% 10
Gross domestic saving Percent of
5.5 15 19.5 254.5% 29.6
GDP
Government finance
Percent of
Domestic revenue 14 17.1 14.4 2.9% 18.8
GDP
Percent of
Tax revenue 11.3 15 12.9 14.2% 17.2
GDP
Total poverty-oriented Percent of
12.3 17.3 11.7 -4.9% 14.6
expenditure GDP
Percent of
Total expenditure 18.6 23.7 18.7 0.5% 22.6
GDP
External sector
Percent of
Total exports 13.6 22.5 12.8 -5.9% 20.6
GDP
Source: Own calculations based on GTP I and GTP II documents.

The GTP II objectives related to agricultural development and rural transformation are much like
those in GTP I25 and align specifically with several targets from SDGs 1, 2, 3, 6, 8, 10, 12, 13, 15,
and 17.26 The GTP II also aligns with Malabo Declaration targets related to achieving agricultural
GDP growth of 6 percent or more, doubling agricultural productivity, increasing access to inputs and
extension services, mainstreaming resilience and risk management practices, and implementing
effective water management systems.

25 As before, the four key pillars related to food and nutrition security in GTP II are increasing agricultural income,
production, and productivity; decreasing child malnutrition and mortality; building a climate resilient economy; and
implementing a disaster mitigation and management strategy to reduce vulnerability to shocks.
26 See the National Planning Commission’s GTP II Policy Matrix document for a more extensive mapping of the GTP II

objectives and targets against the SDGs:

http://dagethiopia.org/new//docstation/com_content.article/100/gtp_ii_policy_matrix_english_final__august_2016.pdf.

35
In summary, while there clearly are strategies in place to address FNS needs in Ethiopia, (and they
align with those set forth by regional and international political bodies), there is a mismatch between
commitment and performance. Resource gaps, misallocation of resources, and low adoption rates
of nutrition guidelines and agricultural best practices can potentially explain the disconnect between
strong policy commitments and weak performance. The next chapter discusses implemented
programs and their progress and implementation challenges.

36
4 Programs and institutional innovations in Ethiopia’s
quest for FNS
4.1 The Agricultural Growth Program
Agricultural growth is fundamental to the development of Ethiopia. It accounts for 47 percent of
the country’s GDP, around 90 percent of its exports, and employs around 85 percent of the
population (NBE, 2010). However, for many years the sector has been characterized by small-
holder subsistence farmers tilling fragmented and highly degraded land with extremely low
productivity. Transforming the economy has to start with the agricultural sector. Cognizant of this
fact, the Ethiopian government has accorded high priority to the sector in its various policy papers
and sector strategies. However, until recently, the focus for many years has been on rehabilitating
and supporting food insecure areas with low productivity. This focus on chronically food insecure
areas is based on the premise of providing assistance where the need is highest. However,
focusing on food insecure areas has resulted in neglect to areas with higher potential. The
agriculturally more productive areas, if supported with the right programs, can produce more and
help improve the food security status of less endowed areas.27

The Agricultural Growth Program (AGP), initiated in 2010 and implemented in two phases by the
government of Ethiopia with the support of USAID and the World Bank, is a major departure from
previous projects in that it targets high potential areas based on suitability for agricultural
activities.28 The AGP is comprehensive in that it addresses aspects of the agricultural sector
ranging from improving productivity; streamlining the marketing of agricultural products; promoting
agricultural value addition through agro-processing; improving commercialization of the sector;
and strengthening rural-urban linkages by addressing bottlenecks in the entire value chain. While
the Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources29 and its regional affiliates are the major
governmental stakeholders, other project and time-bound institutes like the Agricultural
Transformation Agency (ATA) and the Capacity Building for Scaling up of Evidence-based

27 According to a baseline report, households in the AGP woredas recorded shorter duration of food-insecurity seasons,
higher dietary diversity score, and lower proportion of stunted children than households in the non-AGP woredas.
However, the proportion of underweight and wasted children is higher for AGP woredas (ESSP, 2011).
28 These are areas with potentially irrigable land, easy access to infrastructure, and initial institutional capacity to

undertake the program.

29 The current Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources (MoANR), before its most recent institutional restructuring,

previously had different names such as Ministry of Agriculture (MoA), and Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development
(MoARD).

37
Practices in Agricultural Production in Ethiopia (CASCAPE), are involved in the implementation of
the project.

Initial project estimates of AGP I indicate that the project costed around $265 million and was
funded by the government and international donors including the World Bank, UNDP, CIDA,
USAID and others. Looking at the backing of the government and its international development
partners, AGP is considered as a multi-faceted investment mechanism of the government and its
development partners.

The AGP has two major components and a number of sub-components. The first component,
agriculture production and commercialization, strengthens supportive institutions, scales up best
practices, and promotes marketing and agri-business development. The second component is
small-scale rural infrastructure development and water management. The first phase of the AGP,
launched in 2010, started in the selected woredas of four regions of the country (Oromia, Amhara,
Tigray, and Southern Nations Nationalities Peoples Regional State (SNNPR)) and was rolled out
on a gradual basis. The program is aligned with the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture
Development Program (CAADP) targets and national development strategies, including
Agriculture Development Led Industrialization (ADLI), Plan for Accelerated and Sustained
Development to End Poverty (PASDEP) and Rural Development Programs (RDPs). According to
the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, the AGP was designed to address systemic
bottlenecks to agricultural growth and meaningfully contribute to sustained rural development
(MoAD, 2010).

Under the umbrella of the AGP, there is a side project called Agricultural Growth Program-Agri
Business and Market Development (AGP-AMDe) (2011-2016). This project works on income-
generating activities by increasing the productivity and effectiveness of value chains of select
agricultural products such as chickpeas, coffee, honey, maize, sesame, and wheat in the AGP
woredas of in Oromia, Amhara, Tigray, and SNNPR. The six commodities were selected for the
dual reason of improving food security and increasing incomes of smallholder farmers. By the end
of the five-year period, AGP-AMDe aspires to double the gross margins and significantly reduce
post-harvest losses to more than 1 million small-holder beneficiary farmers.

Implementation and data collection challenges have hindered rigorous impact evaluations of the
AGP I. For example, the program was not implemented in some of the woredas when the mid-

38
term data was collected.30 In addition, some of the interventions, like investments in irrigation,
need time to have a discernible impact (ESSP, 2013).31 According to the then ministry of
agriculture32 (MoA, 2015), poor coordination among program implementation agencies, skills-
related capacity gaps, and poor planning at the lower administrative levels were also major
obstacles.

AGP II, which was launched in 157 woredas, including 95 from AGP I, has now expanded to
encompass seven regional states and one city administration.33 On top of increasing agricultural
productivity and commercialization, which were the focus areas of AGP I, phase two tackles
challenges of dietary diversity and focuses on improving consumption patterns of households.
Cross-cutting issues like gender, nutrition, and climate-smart agriculture also form critical aspects
of AGP II.

AGP II is estimated to cost around $581.8 million of which around $350 million is covered by loans
and grants from international development assistance (IDA), while the remaining balance is
covered by co-finances from international development partners including Canada’s Department
of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development (DFATD), USAID, the Netherlands, the European
Commission (EC), Spanish Agency for International Development (AECID), and Italy’s
International Development Cooperation.

30 Furthermore, BDS a consultancy firm involved in the collection of baseline data of the AGP identified serious flaws
encountered in the baseline survey. Firstly, many of the outcome variables used in the survey were not designed
properly. The outcomes were not measurable, achievable, and relevant and time bound. Secondly, the indicators were
not properly designed; they lack clarity, were not specific enough and at time were even difficult to measure.
31 The mid-term survey conducted in 2012 on 93 woredas of which 63 are AGP woredas have mixed findings.

Accordingly although average yield and revenue is relatively higher in the AGP woredas, after controlling for household
and village level heterogeneities, the mid line survey report (2013) did not finding significantly different yield index and
total revenue in AGP woredas.
32 The current Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources (MoANR), before its most recent institutional restructuring,

previously had different names such as Ministry of Agriculture (MoA), and Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development
(MoARD).
33 The initial AGP II implementation period was from 30-Sep-2014 to 30-June-2020, however, the start and end date of

AGP II is revised from April 2017 to 2021, respectively to allow more time the AGP I impact evaluation of AG I to be
completed and due to other implementation challenges, according to informal correspondence with MoANR.

39
Box 1. Interview insights on the agriculture sector in Ethiopia:
Challenges and ways forward

One critical aspect of agriculture repeatedly raised during the interview sessions held for the purpose
of this study is that agriculture is not considered a business in Ethiopia. The overriding ideology
concerning agriculture is that it is not a venture where profit-maximizing entrepreneurs engage,
according to respondents. This condition is evidenced by, for instance, lack of access to credit to
farmers: Respondents contended that banks do not consider farmers viable clients. Further, farmers
do not have easy and direct access to the market and other inputs.

Of course, the respondents acknowledged that agriculture is a risky business that depends on the
vagaries of weather and agro-ecological situations, making it difficult to attract private sector
investment and insurance. However, they argued that if the right support (such as tax breaks and
cheap loans) is provided, private investors would be interested to invest in the sector. One
respondent discussed the need to support the entire value chain of the sector, which involves
improving agricultural productivity, streamlining the logistics sector, improving rural infrastructure and
supporting the development of agro-processing industries. Regional organizations like the African
Development Bank are assisting in commercializing agriculture by investing in interventions that
improve the competitiveness of the sector. Governmental project office interviewees also indicated
that there are programs that are designed to commercialize Ethiopia’s subsistence farming against
the backdrop of the usual perception against agriculture as a business venture. For instance, the
Agriculture Commercial Cluster (ACC) is an initiative of the Agricultural Transformation Agency (ATA)
that primarily works on commercializing agriculture and mainstreaming agriculture as a business.

The interviewees further argued for the need to attract foreign direct investment (FDI) in the
agriculture sector. Based on the experience of other African countries, a respondent said that
promoting Ethiopia’s suitable agro-ecological conditions and fast-improving business environment
might better attract FDI into the country. Nevertheless, another respondent argued that private
investment in agriculture has failed to bear fruit. Investors engaged in agriculture (both locally and
through FDI) were provided cheap credit and easily irrigable land with cheap lease prices; however,
the investors diverted the loans to other investment ventures, and the majority of investments have
stopped operations.

Modernizing the agricultural sector was another important challenge raised by the respondents, such
as adopting modern irrigation systems. Development partners like IFAD are already assisting in
small-scale irrigation projects that improve agriculture productivity and are financially feasible.
Moreover, ATA has an active irrigation system project to help small-holder farmers reduce their
heavy dependence on rain fed agriculture.

In Ethiopia, more emphasis is given to increasing production of the agriculture sector than
improving the productivity of individual farmers, it seems. The respondents claimed that small-holder
farmers’ productivity is very low and the focus for most part have been on increasing overall
production of the sector by bringing more area of land under cultivation. The same is true with regards
to livestock. The respondents claimed that to talk about agriculture in Ethiopia is to discuss issues

40
 related to crop production. The livestock sub-sector is neglected although it is the prime means of
livelihood for significant part of the population and source of foreign currency for the country.
Pastoralists, due to the nature of their lifestyle are exposed to higher environmental risk and get
minimum support from the government and development partners. In 2013, the government of
Ethiopia established Livestock State Ministry that is solely responsible for overseeing the livestock
sector and addressing the various challenges facing pastoralist communities.

The marketing of agricultural products has been one of the critical bottlenecks to the development of
the sector in Ethiopia too. Even at times when farmers produce surpluses, they fail to commercially
benefit because of a lack of well-functioning agriculture markets. The respondents had varying
opinions, especially in regard to the intermediaries who serve as middlemen between farmers and
consumers. One group of respondents considered middlemen entrepreneurs who facilitate
agricultural trade. To other group of respondents, middlemen are often seen as brokers who take
advantage of producers, especially in the marketing of perishable agricultural products like fruits and
vegetables. However, both groups of respondents agreed on the need to improve the marketing of
agricultural products in the country.

Innovation schemes in agriculture

Interview results held with major project offices involved in transforming the agricultural sector in the
country indicated that innovative large-scale programs are being undertaken to address the systemic
bottlenecks of the agricultural sector, and to improve the capacity of implementing institutions. The
ATA is one such time-bounded institute working to identify and address systematic bottlenecks to
the growth of the agricultural sector and to provide implementation support to relevant bureaus. The
respondents at the ATA indicated two flagship programs that have helped modernize the agricultural
sector in Ethiopia. First, the ETHIO-SIS project, a digital soil mapping initiative of the ATA, studies
the fertilizer needs of different soil types across the country and recommends types of fertilizer for
improving their nutrient content—and thus their—productivity. Second, to tackle the credit constraints
facing farmers in Ethiopia, the ATA introduced the Input Voucher System, which provides credit at
the right time, improves the saving of farmers, and significantly reduces stress sales since farmers
can now sell when the prices are right.

4.2 The National Nutrition Program

While a number of national and sector-specific policies and strategies touched upon nutrition
security, it was only in 2008 that the government of Ethiopia drafted the first National Nutrition
Program (NNP) in an attempt to bring a focused, strategic, and multi-sectoral approach to address
the perennial problem of malnutrition in a coordinated manner.34 The move brought together

34While the National Nutrition Strategy, also launched in 2008, highlighted the roadmap and identifies priorities, the
program discusses the detailed action plans, timeline and costing of the national nutrition strategy.

41
isolated programs and interventions scattered across various sectors and undertaken by national
and non-governmental stakeholders and facilitated pooling (national and external) resources
targeted at achieving nutrition security.

The first national nutrition program, which was implemented over 2008-2013, had the general
objective of attaining adequate nutrition status in a sustainable and cost-effective way, giving
special attention to the nutritional status of children under the age of five and pregnant and
lactating women. Moreover, the program aimed at protecting society from unhealthy dietary
patterns and lifestyles. The program has four strategic objectives and a number of specific
objectives. The four strategic objectives are:

1. Improving the nutritional status of women (15-49 years), and adolescents (10-19 years).
2. Improving the nutritional status of infants and children under the age of five.
3. Improving delivery of nutrition services for patients of all age groups with both
communicable and non-communicable diseases.
4. Improving the implementation of nutrition-sensitive interventions across sectors (such as
agriculture, education, and water).

By the end of 2013, the program targeted to bring down the high incidence of underweight, stunting
and wasting in the country. Accordingly, it was planned to reduce underweight from 38 to 30
percent, stunting from 46 to 40 percent and under-five wasting from 11 to 5 percent. Nevertheless,
the targets were hardly achieved in the stated period.

Based on 2013 a government assessment, the first NNP faced a number of challenges, including
an initial lack of inter-sectoral coordination among participating sectors. The organizational
structure to implement NNP at the federal level was inadequately present or totally absent to
facilitate implementation at the regional and/or woreda levels. Second, the programs and
strategies of the other participating sectors did not adequately address the issue of nutrition. Third,
the program performed poorly in mainstreaming gender-sensitive policies and building the human
capacity of people involved in implementing the nutrition program. The program was also not
successful in generating data from all relevant programs, making the exchange of experience and
learning from various programs extremely difficult. Finally, the program failed to include lifecycle
approach, like the first 1,000 days in the life of the child that would have tackled the
intergenerational cycle of malnutrition.

In 2013, the government revised the National Nutrition Program to address the shortcomings of
the previous program. Towards this end, the second nutrition program (2013-2015 period)

42
incorporated a structure that clearly defined the roles and responsibilities of each sector with an
accountability matrix and costing for all planned activities.35 At the federal level, the national
coordination body chaired by the federal Ministry of Health and co-chaired by state ministers of
Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources and Ministry of Education are responsible for
leadership, policy decisions, and coordination of the national nutrition program. Around 10 relevant
ministries, members of the donor community, private sector, and academia are members of the
national coordination body. The coordination body is decentralized and extends to the regional
states, woreda, and kebeles following the federal arrangement of the country.

The second national nutrition program was also aligned with the Millennium Development Goals
and other national sectoral programs. The main targets stipulated by the program were bringing
down the prevalence of under-five stunting, wasting, and under-nutrition in women of reproductive
age to 30, 3, and 19 percent respectively by the end of 2015. In addition to the strategic objectives
of the first NNP, the revised NNP has a fifth objective of improving multi-sectoral coordination and
institutional strengthening to ensure implementation of the programs and nutrition service delivery.
Furthermore, unlike the first national nutrition program, the revised program follows the life-cycle
approach with emphasis given to the first 1,000 days of life from the mother’s pregnancy through
the child’s second birthday. Each required activity over the program period is budgeted and costed.
Accordingly, the program is estimated to cost $547 million for the three-year period where almost
half of the budget goes to activities done in 2014, while a third of the budget is to be used in the
last year.36

Both government and the donor community play crucial roles in implementing the program. The
Ministry of Health is the lead government agency that is responsible for overseeing nutrition
projects in the country. The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development is streamlining nutrition
through the nutrition-sensitive agricultural strategy. The Ministry of Education, on the other hand,
manages the national school health and nutrition strategy in which school feeding is key
component. The Ministry of Water is running safe water and sanitation projects like WASH (Water
Supply Sanitation and Hygiene). Non-governmental organizations play critical role too. Some of
the bilateral and multilateral actors that are active in implementation of the NNP are UNICEF,
USAID, DFID, WHO, WFP, World Bank, COOPI, CIDA, and Irish Aid.

35 The accountability and results matrix outlines the core results and their indicators as well as the sectors accountable
and the evaluation period for these indicators. The matrix hence serves as a monitoring and evaluation framework for
all nutrition programs and projects in Ethiopia.
36 Of the total budget, 88.5 percent will be applied to improving the nutritional status of mothers, infants, young children,

and children under the age of five.

43
Currently, the government of Ethiopia is also in the process of drafting a new national nutrition
policy, building on the national nutrition strategy and programs implemented since 2008 to address
policy gaps and implementation challenges including coordination among line ministries.
According to Relief Web, the policy will be effective at the end of 2017.

4.2.1 “Sekota” declaration: The epitome of commitment to nutrition security

The drought of 1984 was devastating, resulting in hundreds of thousands of deaths due to a famine
that ensued. The name Ethiopia became entwined with drought and famine after pop stars
convened to help the victims and raise funds through the live-aid concerts. Although a good part
of the northern provinces of the former Wello and Tigray administrative regions were affected by
the famine, the small town of Sekota stood out as the worst hit.

Three decades later, Ethiopia still suffers from high incidence of poverty and malnutrition, along
with recurrent drought, including one in 2016. Those same places continue to experience high
incidences of stunting, reaching around 80 percent in some pockets of villages (USAID, 2014).
The government of Ethiopia, realizing this perennial problem, came up with a very comprehensive
policy document named after Sekota.

The Sekota declaration showcases the strong commitment of the government to end malnutrition
by 2030. The declaration was launched alongside the Third International Conference on Financing
for Development held in Addis Ababa in July 2015. Since then, the Sekota declaration has
attracted international attention, and many bilateral and multilateral stakeholders pledged to
support the government to achieve its set goals.37 On the part of the Ethiopian government, the
Sekota declaration is a multi-sectoral commitment that brought nine ministries as signatories of
the declaration.38 Recognizing that ending child malnutrition requires coordinated efforts from all
stakeholders, the implementation plan of the declaration emphasizes improving adolescent, infant,
and maternal nutrition, increasing access to water and hygienic services, building resilient social
protection systems, and supporting the economic empowerment of women, and improving access
to education especially girl’s education. The declaration gives impetus to the national strategies
designed to tackle the problem of food and nutrition insecurity (FDRE, 2016).

37USAID, GATES, WB, and the EU are some of the major supporters/partners of the Sekota program/initiative.
38Some of the signatory ministries include the Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources (MoANR.), Ministry of
Health ( MoH), Ministry of Trade (MoT), Ministry of Industry (MoI), Ministry of Education (MoE), Ministry of Finance and
Economic Cooperation (MoFEC), and Ministry of Women and Children’s Affairs (MoWCA).

44
The declaration is to be implemented in three phases. The first phase, which runs from 2016 to
2018, is the innovation phase where the piloting of innovative programs is run along the Tekeze
river basin in Amhara and Tigray regional states. At this stage, the plan is to establish a community
lab and learning-by-doing centers that can later be scaled up. The plan envisions to expand to
vulnerable communities in the second phase of the program (between 2019 and 2020). Finally,
the plan will roll out nationally in the third phase over 2020-2030.

Box 2. Challenges in achieving nutrition security in Ethiopia:

Insights from key interviews

Findings from the key informant interviews held for the purpose of this study indicate that the
challenges in achieving nutrition security are complex in their nature and need more attention than
those of food security. The challenges identified through the interviews fall into three major
categories: lack of coordination between implementing agencies, knowledge or information gaps,
and lack of capacity (both financial and human resources).

1. Lack of intersectoral coordination

Coordination among implementing agencies is crucial for a multi-sectoral issues like that of nutrition.
Respondents agreed that, in Ethiopia, intersectoral coordination among the various bodies involved
in the nutrition security is poor and, at times, non-existent. An interviewee with long hands-on
experience in the sector explained that the National Nutrition Program has 14 signatory ministries
and the planning is very comprehensive with clear indicators, but none of these agencies “own” the
document. The Ministry of Health has the role of coordinating other sectors but has limited mandates
to execute the program. Some of the signatories of NNP do not even understand what role they
play in the implementation of the program. Even those ministries taking part in the implementation
process have not yet included the issue of nutrition security as one of their core businesses.

The coordination failure is also manifested at the regional and lower administrative levels. While the
federal government has set up a structure to bring all pertinent line ministries together, the structure
is fragmented and varies from one region to the other. Another interviewee said that even when
there are attempts to coordinate there are no concrete mechanisms in place to jointly implement
the action plans. Every sector ministry is running to address their own missions instead of getting
involved in projects that need their concerted efforts.

Another discussant acknowledged the government’s commitment to nutrition security epitomized

by the Sekota declaration. However, there are little efforts made to integrate the Sekota declaration
with projects on the ground. The declaration was a campaign launched with high fanfare but lost its
momentum when going to actual implementation.

45
 2. Poor implementation capacity

Lack of adequate resources has hampered the implementation of different programs designed to
reduce nutrition insecurity in Ethiopia. Interviewees argued that the government prioritizes
production-based agriculture and allocates limited resources to projects geared towards achieving
nutrition security. Rather, many projects on nutrition security are donor funded. Moreover, the local
human capacity for implementing the projects is very poor. There are few highly trained experts in
the field of nutrition in the country, making the projects highly dependent on foreign experts. There
is also high labor turnover in the relevant government agencies mainly because of poor
compensations and benefit packages.

3. Incomplete information and knowledge about nutrition

Nutrition security is intergenerational and highly correlated with the development of society. Lack of
information and knowledge about nutrition goes a long way in explaining the poor status of nutrition
in Ethiopia. Poor eating habits, lack of knowledge about hygiene, and cultural practices that do not
encourage better nutrition are rife. Thus, discussants argued that achieving food security and having
surplus production does not necessarily translate into nutrition security. Households need to be
educated and sensitized to diversifying their diets. An interviewee argued that farmers in Ethiopia
would rather sell nutritious animal products than feed those products to their kids. Already, simple
WASH practices help in getting better health results, which ultimately reduce nutrition insecurity.

Innovative programs and initiatives

Although the interviewees indicated that there are a number of challenges, they also highlighted
some innovative initiatives and programs geared towards achieving nutrition security in the country.
According to the respondents, the health extension program, which serves as the vehicle through
which nutrition programs are implemented, is one of the key institutional innovations in the fight
against nutrition insecurity. The community-based nutrition program was particularly identified as a
successful case. In it, health extension workers demonstrated preparation of balanced diet to rural
communities and further taught improved child feeding methods. Another exemplary innovative
scheme is a program that the introduces locally produced food that replace corn soy blends—one
of the fortified blended foods commonly used by USAID and implementing partners like the World
Food Program. The new nutritious substitute is a mixture of cereals and pulses that is sourced
locally and verified to contain the necessary ingredients by the Ethiopian Public Health Research
Institute.

4.3 Resilience
4.3.1 The Ethiopian Productive Safety Net program
Ethiopia has suffered from food insecurity due to perennial large-scale, drought-induced famine.
The response by the government and the international community has, for many years, been to

46
inject emergency food aid as immediate response. However, if the country is going to truly reduce
the number of food insecure people, a coordinated, large-scale intervention is necessary. The
productive safety net program (PSNP), launched in 2005, is a major intervention by the Ethiopian
government and its development partners to reduce household vulnerability, improve resilience to
shocks, and promote sustainable community development in food insecure areas of rural
Ethiopia.39

The PSNP in Ethiopia is one of the largest social protection programs in Africa. The latest round
of PSNP provides support to around 8 million people. For the five years between 2009 and 2014,
the project cost around $2.1 billion. The program began with around 190 chronically food insecure
woredas in the four regional states of Ethiopia: Tigray, Amhara, Oromia, and SNNRP. A mix of
geographic and community targeting was used to select beneficiary woredas and households. Use
of historic food aid allocation data was used in determining the number of beneficiaries to be
supported in each PSNP woreda.

The PSNP has two major components. The public works component targets households with able-
bodied members to participate in productive work such as construction of infrastructure projects
like rural roads, small-scale irrigation, and environmental conservation activities such as
reforestation or farm land terracing in exchange for cash or in-kind payments. This is a form of
employment in the lean seasons of the year (January to June). The direct support component
provides unconditional cash transfers to households who could not participate in the public works
due to old age, sickness, or supporting disabled household members. By participating in different
community projects in exchange for cash, households prone to food insecurity are expected to be
able to smooth out their consumption patterns.

Another critical goal of the program is protecting households from the distress sale of their
productive assets (such as livestock and seeds) in times of food shortages, which only
exacerbates the situation of poor households. Finally, the program creates community assets,
such as irrigation, watersheds, soil, and water conservation activities on communal lands, which
in turn improve land productivity and ultimately bring about sustainable development.

The PSNP was complemented by Other Food Security Programs (OFSP) to generate additional
income and assets for the participating households by improving participants’ access to credit and

39 According to project documents, a number of donors are involved in funding PSNP including the World Bank (major
financier), DFID, Irish Aid, European Commission, CIDA, the government of the Netherlands, Danish International
Development Agency, USAID, and the WFP.

47
productive inputs (such as livestock, bees, agricultural tools, and pastureland), as well as the
adoption of small-scale irrigation and water-harvesting schemes. However, the OFSP failed to
bring changes mainly due to implementation problems (World Bank, 2011), such as lack of
resources, skills gaps of agents providing OFSP services, absence of clear guidelines for targeting
beneficiaries, and lack of coordination between the government and implementing NGOs
(Berhane et al., 2013).

In 2009, the government, with the assistance of international partners, introduced the Household
Asset Building Program (HABP) to replace the OFSP. HABP provides multifaceted activities to
support agricultural production, food security, and household asset accumulation. The primary
objective of HABP is income diversification through the facilitation of access to credit and
assistance to households in preparing business plans. Compared to the OFSP, HABP is better
aligned with extension services, woreda-level micro and small enterprise bureaus, off farm
technical officers, and programs for women and youth. HABP is also more focused and better
staffed as it assigns three development agents (DA), each specializing in crop, animal, and
agricultural technologies, to each beneficiary kebele. Unlike the OFSP, credit services are
separate from extension services and channeled to beneficiaries through local micro finance
institutions, and rural saving and credit cooperatives. Finally, there was better targeting of
beneficiaries of HABP. A combination of the PSNP and HABP will ultimately result in graduating
from the program that is defined as “the ability to fulfill food needs for the entire 12 months of the
year and have the resilience to small shocks in the absence of transfers from PSNP.”

Evaluations of the PSNP/HABP have generally shown positive impacts on the livelihoods of
households (Gilligan et al., 2009, Berhane et al., 2011; 2014). For instance, Berhane et al (2014),
using the 2006, 2008, and 2010 rounds of PSNP survey data, find that the participants in the public
works component of the PSNP program significantly improved their food security status (defined
as having no problem to satisfy the food needs of households) and livestock asset ownership.
Furthermore, households who participated in both PSNP and HABP witnessed larger impacts.40

However, there was no evidence of improvements in nutrition indicators in the participating

woredas. Berhane (2014), using 2008-2012 PSNP survey data, found no evidence of the PSNP
reducing the incidence of child stunting and wasting. Poor water and hygiene practices, failure to

40Notably, combining PSNP with HABP resulted in increase of food security by 1.5 months and household assets by
0.99 Tropical Livestock Unit (TLU), compared to an increase of food security duration by 1.29 months and a livestock
asset ownership by 0.38 TLU for those who participated in the public works only.

48
consume balanced diets, and lack of information on good feeding practices were reasons blamed
for the lack of impact (Berhane, 2014).

Repeated droughts continue to put pressure on the efforts made towards food security. In fact, in
recent years, the cycle of drought has become shorter. What used to be once-a-in-a-decade
scenario is now happening every two to three years, challenging both the adequacy of resources
to and graduation rates from PSNP.41 Hence, it is paramount to strengthen food security programs.
Towards this end, the PSNP-IV (2014-2019) is going to be implemented in coordination with the
health extension program, which is an internationally acclaimed success story (Workie and
Ramana, 2013).

Box 3: Interview insights on the Productivity Safety Net Program:

Challenges and success stories

The Productive Safety Net Program (PSNP) is one of the major interventions to curb the problem of
food security in Ethiopia. Indeed, many of the interviewees approached for this research were keen to
discuss the PSNP. Respondents acknowledged that the PSNP plays a critical role in improving the food
security status of the country and building resilience to shocks. Respondents indicated that the PSNP
is an integral component of the strategic documents like the GTP and national agricultural and rural
development papers. Moreover, the respondents argued the fact that there is a directorate within the
Ministry of Agriculture and Natural resources that is exclusively responsible for implementation of the
PSNP indicates government’s level of commitment to the program. On top of generous international
assistance from bilateral and multilateral donors, the government allocates significant resources to the
PSNP indicating the government’s level of commitment to the program.

Respondents further indicated that the program covers large parts of the country. Currently 349 woredas
and more than 8 million beneficiaries take part in the program. If it were not for the shortage of resources,
the program could have increased beneficiaries to close to 10 million people, many said. The
interviewees further indicated that the government has a plan to merge emergency relief with the PSNP
and is currently working on producing a document with the assistance of pertinent national and
international stakeholders.

One of the unique features of the PSNP program, as reported by the respondents, is the continuous
and strict monitoring and evaluation system in place since its launch. First, a large-scale survey of the
program is conducted and evaluation reports are produced by reputable researchers. Second, a joint
rapid response mission of selected sample woredas is conducted three times a year involving
representatives from the government and donors. Third, a joint review and implementation mission is

41According to the respondents from MoA/PSNP directorate, between 2000-2006 Ethiopian Calendar, 3.5 million people
graduated from the program but because of repeated drought, there has been no graduation after 2006. People who
graduated may have also returned to PSNP due to the drought; hence, there are 8 million beneficiaries in PSNP IV.

49
conducted twice a year. Finally, there is a strict financial audit system that accounts every resource
spent on the project.

The respondents also discussed the following innovative schemes unique to the PSNP in Ethiopia.

1. PSNP-donor coalition team: The lion’s share of the PSNP program is funded by donors. There is
a joint donor coalition team for the food security sector/PSNP. The team has delegates from the 10
members (World Bank, USAID, and UNICEF are the major contributors) and it is hosted by the World
Bank’s Ethiopia office. The team has an independent dissemination document and implementation
manuals. It provides technical assistance through international experts, using rigorous evaluation
and monitoring tools and research. The team oversees program implementation and requests
standard reports from the government before releasing funding to the program. There is a strict
financial management and controlling system, and accountability issues are included in the
document. The rigorous procedures in place are one of the main reasons donors have financed the
PSNP program continuously since its inception.

2. The joint introduction of PSNP with its three major components (food security, resilience
building, livelihood support). Capacity development and awareness programs are first provided
to the beneficiaries before providing them with credit and saving systems. The goal of all these
components is to graduate chronically food insecure people and ascertain self-sufficiency.

3. The introduction of the nutrition dimension as one component of PSNP IV. This is done through
the inclusion of nutritious foods in the existing food budget of the beneficiaries. To this end, gender
and social development and nutrition training have been started for implementers and clients. In
addition, the agricultural extension system has a food and nutrition case team to address FNS issues
at the household level.

4. The Climate Smart Initiative (CSI). Now an additional component of PSNP, the CSI further
integrates resilience-building programs with natural resource management programs, such as public
works, water and soil conservation, and rehabilitation activities. The mandate is given to the woreda
Natural Risk Management (NRM) focal person to oversee the initiative and to directly contribute to
the climate mitigation processes.

Despite its many successes and innovations, the PSNP has faced challenges. Some of the challenges
repeatedly mentioned by respondents included: shortage of resources, poor targeting of beneficiaries,
low implementation capacity, failure to coordinate the PSNP with other donor-supported programs, poor
use of the information management system, and failure to graduate beneficiaries from the program.
(Due to repeated drought there was no program graduation in recent years and some that graduated
were pegged back.)

50
Box 4. Insights from interviews on disaster and reduction mitigation
in Ethiopia: Challenges and success stories

Ethiopia has faced large-scale drought and its citizens have suffered from the resulting famine and
destitution. Although the country is still prone to drought-induced natural calamities, the degree to
which drought turns into large-scale famine and death has significantly reduced in recent years.
According to interviewees, the overhauling of the disaster risk management system of the country
should be credited for this success. But what has actually changed and what lessons can we learn
from the country’s fight against disasters? What challenges does the country face in terms of
mitigating them?

According to high-level officials with extensive experience in disaster mitigation in Ethiopia, the
positive responses to disasters are brought in by an early warning system, successful disaster risk
reduction (DRR) planning, innovative financing schemes, and streamlined organizational structures.

The country has a very extensive DRR planning scheme. The DRR plan is decentralized to the
smallest administrative unit, the woreda level, and is synced with the regional and national disaster
and risk reduction commissions. The main contents of the woreda plan are identifying underlying
causes of drought risks at the woreda, analyzing its impact on food security status, and suggesting
mitigating strategies. Each woreda plan has the list of specific risks in its area, such as livestock
disease, problems related to water logging, and soil management. The planning process at the
woreda level involves collection of drought and other risk-related data, analysis of the raw data, and
validation of the results with officials from the respective woreda to finalize the DRR plan and draft
area-specific mitigation strategies. Using the plan, the woreda prepares a risk profile that serves as
the basis for any intervention in mitigating risks.

Innovative financing schemes have played a crucial role in changing the state of disaster reduction
in Ethiopia. Interview respondents indicated that regions very prone to drought introduced a reserve
fund that serves as an emergency source of financing for disaster risk before help arrives from the
federal government and international donors. The regional government allocates a certain amount
of money to the fund, which is supplemented by donations from the private sector, government
employees, and other donors. The fund is kept at different administrative structures ranging from
woredas to zones and regional administrations so that when an emergency surfaces the money will
be released to the beneficiaries with minimum bureaucratic hurdles. Moreover, at times when there
is no immediate need of emergency funding, 30 percent of the fund is used for development
endeavors designed to build resilience of the local community.

The early warning system of the country has been revamped and designed to be more responsive
to disasters. According to the respondents, the country’s early warning system is more proactive.
There are 15 disaster risk indicators complied at the woreda level and reported to the regions on a
weekly basis. The region intern produces a monthly early warning report. The national disaster and
risk reduction commission finally compiles the data sent by the regions and produces a seasonal
assessment. The seasonal assessment is a comprehensive report that is an integral part of the
humanitarian requirement document produced in cooperation with international donors.

51
 Finally, institutional restructuring has played an important role in the fight against disasters in
Ethiopia. Today, the National Disaster Risk Management Commission (NDRMC) is an independent
organization directly accountable to office of the prime minister. This change has brought
empowerment and effective enforcement rather than the bureaucratic challenges of the past. The
NDRMC has streamlined structures and procedures that have improved the national food security
reserves and the strategic emergency relief fleet, which has significantly improved the transportation
of aid to beneficiaries.

Despite these successes, the country’s disaster management system is also faced with challenges.
According to the respondents some of the challenges include:
 High level of staff turnover, both from the executive officials and the expert-level employees
coupled with lack of highly skilled professionals trained in disaster and risk reduction.
 Lack of modern technologies that can assist in an information processing system-supported early
warning system
 Limited resources because donors’ attention has been shifted to the Middle East and other global
crisis, including South Sudan.
 Increased number of emergency beneficiaries because of the recurrent drought. The frequency
of the drought was between five to 10 years in the past, but now there is drought more often.
 Mainstreaming the DRR programs. There is low level of commitment from some ministries to
plan, follow up, and monitor the disaster risk-related programs because they are busy with their
routine responsibilities.
 Donor dependency. Convincing international community these days is not easy as they need a
repeated appeal and come with their strings attached. “The international community gives priority
to the international media since they trust video supported messages instead of accepting the
government’s formal appeal,” said one respondent.
 Dependency syndrome on part of the beneficiaries. People are developing the habit of waiting
for support from the government and donors.

4.3.2 The Climate Resilient Green Growth strategy (CRGE)

Ethiopia is one of the countries worst hit by the impacts of climate change. Frequent drought and
rainfall variabilities have affected the agricultural sector, which is the mainstay of close to 85
percent of its population. In an attempt to mitigate the impact of climate change and build a resilient
green economy, the Ethiopian government drafted its first-ever Climate Resilient Green Economy
(CRGE) strategic paper in 2011. The strategy forms an integral part of the second phase of the
Growth and Transformation Program of the country (GTP II).

The CRGE strategy of Ethiopia has the ambitious goal of reaching a middle-income country status
with zero net emissions by 2025. This goal requires maintaining the release of greenhouse gases
to 150 Mt Carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e), which would otherwise reach 400 Mt CO2e under

52
business-as-usual approach. In doing so, the CRGE follows a sectoral approach by overseeing
and identifying close to 60 initiatives.

The strategy has four important pillars. The first pillar deals with the adoption of agricultural and
land use efficiency measures that improve both crop and livestock production to achieve food
security and increase the income of farmers. The second pillar states the need to increase the
forest coverage that helps reduce the amount of greenhouse emissions released into the
environment on top of the monetary gains garnered from afforestation. The third pillar expands
environment-friendly power-generating schemes for domestic and export purposes. The final pillar
introduces modern and energy-efficient technologies in critical sectors like transportation, industry,
and construction.

In order to achieve the four pillars, the CRGE has selected fast-track initiatives, which broadly fall
into four categories. First, to meet the growing need of clean energy, the strategy aims to exploit
the huge hydroelectricity potentials of the country, which is estimated to be around 45,000
megawatts. Currently Ethiopia’s generating capacity from all sources does not exceed 4,000
megawatts (Asnake, 2015). Second, the strategy promotes large-scale environmentally friendly
cooking technologies especially in the rural parts of the country, which is considered a major
intervention in realizing green growth. Third, the strategy attributes agriculture as the main source
of greenhouse gas emissions in Ethiopia, with the livestock sector being responsible for close to
40 percent of emissions. (CRGE, 2011). Hence, improving the livestock value chain is considered
as an important initiative in curbing the environment consequences of the sector by the CRGE
strategy. Finally, the strategy aims to reduce emissions resulting from deforestation and forest
degradation. In this regard, the Ministry of Environment, Forestry, and Climate Change has
launched a major project named after the initiative, Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and
Forest Degradation (REDD).

To implement the CRGE strategy successfully, the government of Ethiopia has undergone
institutional restructuring. The former Environment Protection Authority has been elevated to the
Ministry of Environment, Forestry, and Climate Change. The CRGE governance structure is led
by a ministerial steering committee of the CRGE initiative under the office of the prime minster and
is responsible for overseeing the implementation of the strategy. In order to translate the strategy
to sectoral programs and investment plans, CRGE units have been established in key line
ministries such as the Ministry of Environment, Forestry, and Climate Change, Ministry of
Agriculture and Natural Resources, and regional state governments. Moreover, the government
has established a CRGE facility, which is a funding mechanism to mobilize and disburse climate

53
finance under the Ministry of Finance and Economic Cooperation. The facility raises funds from
national and international sources. Accordingly, the facility includes loan arrangements, co-
financing, results-based payments, grants, etc. The CRGE is estimated to cost around $200 billion
over 20 years. The major international partners of the CRGE are UNDP, and the governments of
the United Kingdom, Norway, and Austria.

According to interviewees, there was a weak link between CRGE and GTP I and in GTP II, the
CRGE plan was appended into the GTP II policy document in haste without in-depth discussion.
Consequently, the CRGE strategy is not well integrated with GTP II. Moreover, even GTP II does
not have clearly set resilience indicators, though efforts are underway to develop these indicators
to track performance and to provide the basis for any impact evaluations.

4.3.3 Sustainable Land Management Program (SLMP)

Ethiopia’s agriculture has been heavily dependent on rain-fed traditional farming practices, done
over fragmented and rugged landscape devoid of proper soil conservation activities. Because of
its landscape, the country has been losing billions cubic meters of fertile soil due to water and wind
erosion. A World Bank (2013) study indicates that the country loses between 2 to 5 percent of its
agricultural GDP per annum due to the adverse impacts of land degradation.

The government of Ethiopia and its development partners ventured to tackle the long-standing
issue of natural resources degradation by designing the Sustainable Land Management Program
(SLMP), implemented in two phases since 2008. The SLMP is designed to conserve soil fertility
lost due to difficult topography of the country and preserve biodiversity, sustain agricultural growth,
and reduce vulnerabilities resulting from chronic food insecurity.

The first phase of SLMP (SLMP-I) was implemented during 2008-2013 in six regional states of the
country by introducing sustainable land management practices in select degraded areas deemed
uneconomical and unproductive. Towards this end, SLMP-I benefited about 98,000 rural
households (World Bank, 2013).42 Preliminary assessment of SLMP-I by the then-Ethiopian
Ministry of Agriculture indicated that the program has brought improvements in land management
practices and helped generate additional income for program beneficiaries, justifying project
extension and the birth of the second phase of SLMP (SLMP-II) (MOA, 2013).

42Some of the interventions include rehabilitation of degraded communal lands, construction of cut-off drains and
waterways, planting of nitrogen-fixing leguminous plants, production, and application of compost.

54
SLM-II, implemented over 2014-2019, facilitates investment in sustainable land management,
increases and sustains agricultural productivity through integrated land and water management
practices, and protects ecosystems in 135 watersheds found in the regional states of Amhara,
Tigray, Oromia, SNNPR, Gambela, and Benishangul—thus covering an estimated 1.9 million
direct and indirect beneficiaries. SLMP-II has three major components: integrated watershed and
land management; institutional strengthening, capacity development, and knowledge generation
and management; and rural land administration, certification, and use.

SLMP-II is governed by a national steering committee comprising representatives from the Ministry
of Agriculture and Natural Resources (MoANR), the Ministry of Finance and Economic
Cooperation (MoFEC), the Ministry of Water, Irrigation, and Electricity, the Ethiopian Institute of
Agricultural Research, and the Ministry of Environment, Forestry, and Climate Change (MoEFCC).
MoANR is responsible for the overall coordination and implementation of the project at the federal
level. The ministry has designed a structure that extends to the kebeles, which are the ultimate
project implementers. While the World Bank is the main financer of the project, bilateral
organizations like Germany’s KfW/GIZ are involved by way of providing thematic investments as
well as institutional strengthening and capacity building assistances.

Although a project of this magnitude usually attracts the attention of researchers that conduct
experimental and quasi-experimental impact evaluations, the impact of both phases of SLM is not
well researched. From the few evaluations conducted, the program has brought improvement to
different outcomes. For instance, Schmidt and Tadesse (2015) find that households engaging in
the SLM program during 2010-2014 increased their crop production by 18 percent compared to a
control group.

55
5 Financing FNS needs in Ethiopia
5.1 Government efforts toward financing FNS in Ethiopia
The Ethiopian government’s resource allocation to programs in food and nutrition security
demonstrate a strong commitment towards implementing the different FNS programs. Ethiopia
allocates more than 70 percent of its annual budget towards sectors that reduce poverty (UNDP,
2015). Moreover, for the period 2006-2012, government expenditure on agriculture was high, more
than 10 percent, with average annual growth rate of 22.5 percent (FAO, 2014). The Productive
Safety Net Program and the Household Asset Building Program (HABP) component of the PSNP
make up close to 80 percent of public expenditure on food and agriculture (FAO, 2014).43 In fact,
the main components of agriculture expenditures include payments to PSNP beneficiaries in the
form of direct food aid and cash transfers (23 percent), knowledge dissemination including
capacity building and training (22 percent),44 infrastructure building (15 percent), and subsidies to
agricultural inputs like fertilizer and improved seeds (11 percent).

Financing FNS and development projects in the presence of multiple competing needs stretches
the capacity of the government. The paucity of budgetary sources mainly sourced from domestic
resources and weak tax collection has exacerbated the problem. The latest report by the National
Bank of Ethiopia (NBE, 2016) indicates that government revenue share of GDP is only 15 percent
(NBE, 2016), which is very low even by regional standards, where the average tax share of GDP
for sub-Saharan Africa is 21 percent (IMF, 2015). Although resource allocation under the federal
structure of the country is guided by equity considerations when formulating budgetary
requirements of and allocation to the regional states, the mere size of the resource needs has put
the country under financial stress.

5.2 The role of international actors in financing FNS in Ethiopia

In addition to the Ethiopian government’s contribution to FNS, strong bilateral and multilateral
donor support has been rendered in financing food and security programs of the country.
According to FAO (2014), the share of donor aid in food and agriculture expenditure increased
from 63.8 percent in 2006 to around 83.4 percent in 2012. For instance, a preponderant part of
PSNP (98 percent) during the 2006-2012 period was funded by external sources. According to the

43 MAFAP/FAO (2014) deals with period between 2006-20012 that is why the percentage share of PSNP is very high;
however, there is a component called other payments in which AGP is costed.
44 The knowledge dissemination component in this context refers to the training and capacity building provided to

producers and other agents in the value chain, e.g., training on infrastructure maintenance, farming techniques,
marketing, etc.

56
OECD, in 2012 and 2013, Ethiopia was the second-highest recipient of agricultural and rural
development aid in the world, second to Afghanistan (OECD, 2013).45 Between 2009 and 2013,
20 percent of total committed ODA to Ethiopia went toward agriculture and food aid. Humanitarian
aid, health, and education make up the other key ODA recipient sectors (Figure 9).

Figure 9. Bilateral ODA commitment, by purpose, percentage of total

(2009-2013 average)

3%
5%
Humanitarian aid
7%
25% Health & population

8% Education
Agriculture, forestry, & fishing
Food aid
10% Social infrastructure & services
Economic infrastructure & services

22% Multisector
10%
Other

12%

Source: OECD.

The United States alone contributes to 21.7 percent of agricultural ODA to Ethiopia, while EU
institutions provide 9.4 percent. The United States’ provision of development assistance to
Ethiopia is geared towards agricultural modernization. One example of USAID’s agricultural
initiatives in Ethiopia is the Ethiopia: Land Tenure and Administration Program, a 5-million-dollar
program that supports and enables a land reform system that favors agricultural modernization.
Another channel of assistance from the United States is through Feed the Future (FtF). In 2011,
FtF allocated more than $40 million in nutrition and agricultural development aid to Ethiopia. Both
initiatives focus on the transformation of “Pastoral Ethiopia” into a more productive, commodity-
exporting region (Oakland Institute, 2013). Whereas the United Kingdom’s Department for

45The Development Assistance Committee: Enabling Effective Development- Aid to Agriculture and Rural
Development.

57
International Development’s (DFID) largest share of overseas development assistance in nutrition
went to Ethiopia, amounting to $227 million in 2015 alone (MQSUN, 2017).

The European Development Fund (EDF), the EU’s aid-disbursing instrument, aims to allocate 745
million euros ($790 million) to Ethiopia during the 2014-2020 funding cycle.46 The funds are set to
go toward sustainable agriculture and food security, among other projects. As seen in Figure 10
below, the sustainable agriculture and food security sector is set to receive one-third of the funds,
with the remaining funds split between health, infrastructure, and civil society. In its latest National
Indicative Program for Ethiopia, the EDF announced the funds will be specifically geared toward
supporting Ethiopia’s triple objective—as highlighted in the GTP document—of augmenting
agricultural output, improving sustainable natural resource management, and protecting
vulnerable people by creating long-term resilience.

Figure 10. Fund allocation by sector

1%

7%
Sustainable agriculture and food
security

34% Health

31% Roads and transition to energy

Civil society and synergic

governance
Support measures

27%

Source: European Development Fund.

The CAADP framework has also helped the country mobilize additional resources for its
agricultural programs, both internally and from external sources (Poulton et al., 2014). Following
the G-8 meeting in Italy in 2008, Ethiopia was pledged significant amount of resources for its
agricultural programs.

46 European Development Fund (2014), National Indicative Program for Ethiopia: 2014-2020

58
In the past decade, Ethiopia has experienced two main trends in development co-operation. The
first is the marked decrease in the share of humanitarian aid. The second is the increased share
of development assistance provided in the form of concessional loans compared to grants,
according to Development Assistance Group (DAG) in Ethiopia.47

47Development Assistance Group Ethiopia (DAG), ODA to Ethiopia accessed from http://dagethiopia.org/new/oda-to-
ethiopia

59
6 Conclusion and policy recommendations
The emerging pattern from global and national statistics points toward three priority areas for
improving Ethiopia’s food and nutrition security and achieving the targets set forth by the Malabo
Declaration and SDG2. First, improving access to food (by reducing extreme poverty and
expanding coverage and adequacy of social safety nets), raising awareness on the adoption of
balanced nutrition, and mobilizing resources for improving FNS needs are key intervention areas.
Second, reducing vulnerability to (and mitigating the effects of) consumption and income shocks
through mechanisms such as rural safety nets programs, income diversification, and agricultural
insurance is crucial. Third, building the productive capacity of agriculture to enable the sector to
sustainably maintain long-term food security is vital for success.

Ethiopia’s GTPs, in line with Malabo and SDG2 objectives, clearly outline the government’s plans
to address FNS needs, but greater domestic and external resources must be mobilized to carry
out the plans and address outstanding implementation gaps.

Recommendations for national policymakers

 Improve labor productivity by promoting the production and consumption of high nutritional
value agricultural products by addressing the technological/infrastructural gap on the
production and sale of perishable products such as vegetables, milk, and products rich in
protein.
 Increase access to productivity-enhancing inputs and markets while at the same time
promoting nutrition-sensitive agricultural practices by putting emphasis on the
consumption and the nutritional value of what is being produced.
 Strengthen the capacity of health extension workers and development agents, enhance
their coordination, and jointly assist rural farmers with the practice of nutrition-sensitive
agricultural production and more diversified diets.
 Address multi-sectoral coordination (especially horizontal coordination of line-ministries).
 Plan for scaling up and sustaining social safety net programs, even in the absence of
external support, and mainstream risk mitigation through routine planning and creating
generation of qualified Ethiopian experts in risk professionalism.
 Further domestic resource mobilization efforts (notably by promoting private sector
investment in the sector and treating farmers as entrepreneurs).

60
  Ensure a local presence through public and NGO partnerships, and create an enabling
environment for these partnership, while also addressing resource fragmentation.
 Attract FDI while also tackling the root causes of low conversion rate of FDI projects in the
sector, through the establishment and promotion of risk sharing and insurance
mechanisms.
 Improve the volume and diversity of exports, through new and existing opportunists such
as G-20’s Compact with Africa, agro-industrial park promotions, and AGOA.
 Empower catalytic agencies and institutions, but, at the same time, support capacity
building and get the incentive structures right for staff of implementing public institutions
to ensure uptake of innovations at the national level.
 Facilitate rigorous impact evaluations of the programs through quality baseline and
subsequent data collections of the programs. Data collection, especially on nutrition and
financial resources, is also vital for efficient targeting of places and individuals with highest
needs and for facilitating accountability of implementation, and
 Assess the country’s relative performance in FNS on a regular basis and learn from
regional and peer countries’ best practices in achieving SDG2 and the Malabo targets.

Recommendations for donors

 Build on the lessons learned from the PSNP, especially those that indicate that continuous
evaluation and donor coordination are key for successful implementation.
 Make complementary investments to relax resource constraints, notably in nutrition and
CRGE programs and at lower administrative units as well as promotion of the livestock
sector. The donor community can also assist in getting the wage incentives right to
improve human capacity constraints of under-privileged regions to boost local
implementation capacity.
 Provide technical assistance in interventions that are knowledge- and technology-
intensive programs, while at the same time build local capacity to ensure sustainability.
 Explore the potential of NGO clustering and Core Humanitarian Standard (CHS)
certification to improve efficiency and accountability.
 Promote the establishment of agricultural insurance programs and mainstream
humanitarian/resilience auditing into lending practices, similar to the practice of gender
auditing, thus encouraging productive and equitable distribution of resources.

61
  Facilitate knowledge and experience sharing of successful FNS projects, programs,
processes, and implementation, and
 Empower the local community and invest in its youth to promote ownership and
sustainability of FNS programing on a long-term basis.

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 7 Appendix
List of stakeholders interviewed

I. National policy makers

1. Agricultural Transformation Agency (ATA)- (with Khalid Bomba (CEO of ATA) and
focus group discussion with team of experts at ATA)
2. Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources (MoANR) (with Behailu Shewangizaw
(PSNP capacity development and monitoring and evaluation senior expert) and Hailu
Ankiso (PSNP monitoring and evaluation senior expert))
3. Ministry of Finance and Economic Cooperation (MoFEC) (with Tefera Demeke
(Budget Preparation and Administration Directorate) and Firehiywot Handamo (team
leader, Fiscal policy Directorate, Fiscal policy research)
4. National Planning Commission (NPC) (with Demeke Tsehay- agriculture, natural
resource and environment planning specialist
5. National Disaster Risk Management Commission (NDRMC) (with Tadesse Bekele
Fanta- Senior DRM Adviser)
6. Ethiopian Public Health Institute (EPHI) (with Solomon Eshetu, Food science and
research directorate, acting director)
7. Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) (Dr. Yigeremachew
Seyoum, -project coordinator for the action against desertification)
8. Oromiya Disaster Risk Management Commission (with Mulatu Negassa, director
disaster risk and early warning system; Dawud Musa, senior technical expert )
9. Environment and Climate Research Center (ECRC), Environment for Development
Initiative (focus group discussion with Hailesselsie Medihin, Center Director and team
of experts at ECRC)
II. Development partners
1. World Bank (WB)-Ethiopia office (focus group discussion with Anne Margreth Bakilana-
Senior Economist and team of experts at WB-Ethiopia)
2. International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD)-Ethiopia office (with Demirag,
Han Ulac, country director of Ethiopia)
3. African Development Bank (AfDB)-Ethiopia office ( with SENNOGA, EDWARD BATTE,
Chief County Economist of Ethiopia)
4. United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UN ECA) ( with Adama Ekberg
Coulibaly (Chief, Food Security, Agriculture and Land Section and Medhat Elhelepi,
Economic affairs Officer at Regional Integration and Trade Division (RITD)) and focus
group discussion with team of experts at UN ECA
5. Dan Church Aid- Ethiopia office (with Wakgari Alemu Sirika, DRR specialist)
6. Save the Children (with Abbott, Daniel (Deputy Chief of Party for Growth through
Nutrition))
7. Care Ethiopia (with Selamawit Menkir | CARE Ethiopia CO | Programme Quality and
Learning, Coordinator)
8. World Vision Ethiopia (with Assefa Admasu, food security specialist)
9. Department for International Development (DFID)-Ethiopia (with Berhanu Lakew,
Senior Economist)

63
 Table A1a: Food and nutrition security needs in Ethiopia

Regional Global Sub-Saharan

Indicators Ethiopia average ranking Africa comparison
Calorie gap 102
Undernourishment 35.1% 19.82% 90 Bottom 10
Average dietary energy supply
97.2% 114.46% 100 Bottom 10
adequacy
Lack of enough money to buy
42.02% 53.82% 58
food
Dietary diversity 90
Percent of calories from
76% 61.81% 102 Bottom 10
staples
Average protein supply 61% 64.34% 72
Food consumption score
35.61% 33.69% 20 Bottom 10
(percent with “poor” score)
Child malnutrition 91
Under-5 wasting 10.1% 7.80% 90 Bottom 10
Under-5 stunting 44.2% 34.73% 98 Bottom 10
Anemia in children 51% 60.03% 74
Rural poverty 74
Rural poverty rate 37.80% 51.40% 48
Rural multidimensional poverty
96.27% 69% 81 Bottom 10
headcount

Source: Own calculations based on ERH database.

Note: The above statistics represents a five-year average for the period 2009-2013.

64
 Table A1b: Enabling policy environment for agricultural productivity

Ethiopia’s policy
Regional strength score Sub-Saharan
(SSA) Unit of measurement/ (relative to global Africa
Indicators Ethiopia average Score definition best practice) comparison
A score ranging 1-6, 6 being best). 5 =
Enabling conditions for Government development plans fully recognize
4.52 3.66
rural financial services the importance of a well-functioning rural finance 70
Top 10
subsector.
A score (1-6, 6 being best). 4 = Government has a
Access to water for water resources management strategy that
4.22 3.63
agriculture provides an integrated framework for equitable 64
Top 10
water resources allocation.
A score (1-6, 6 being best). 4 = A majority of rural
poor households, including women, indigenous
Access to land 3.66 3.54 53
populations and other vulnerable groups, have
access to land
An index (0-1, with 1 representing the least parity
between men and women). 0.5 = The law
Women’s secure access
0.5 0.55 guarantees women and men equal rights to own, 50
to land
use and control, but some customary, traditional
or religious practices discriminate against women.
An index (0-1, with 1 representing the least parity
between men and women). 0.5 = The law
Women’s access to guarantees women and men equal rights to
0.5 0.40 0
financial services access formal financial services, but some
customary, traditional or religious practices
discriminate against women.
A score (from 1-6, 6 being best). 4 = Significant
Access to agricultural
3.75 3.72 government efforts to liberalize markets and 45
input markets
reduce rural market distorting policies.

65
General investment climate

A score (from 1-6, 6 being best) 4 = Government

Investment climate for rural
4.21 3.71 is making efforts to encourage private traders to
business 64
open a business. Top 10

An index that ranks countries based on their ease

of doing business with higher rankings indicating
Doing Business index 50.43 48.10 50
better, usually simpler, regulations for businesses
and stronger protections of property rights.
A score (from 1-6, 6 being best) For Ethiopia, 5 =
Its national development plan and budget
Allocation and management
document emphasize the important role of
of resources for rural 4.94 3.67 79
agriculture in poverty reduction and economic
development Top 10
growth, and its policies are consistent with that
analysis.
A score (1-6, 6 being best). 4 = There is a process
Dialogue with rural
4.06 3.82 for rural organizations to enter into dialogue with 61
organizations
or lobby government.

66
Nutrition policies
A binary score that measures whether the
government has published guidelines for a
National dietary guidelines 0.5 0.34 balanced and nutritious diet, where 0 = No and 1 50
= Yes (and anything in between reflects averages
across years).
A binary score that measures whether
governments identify time bound nutrition targets
Time bound nutrition targets 0.5 0.33 in public policy documents, where 0 = No and 1 = 50
Yes (and anything in between reflects averages
across years).
A binary score that measures whether
governments promote complementary feeding
practices of children aged 6–9 months and
Governments promote
1.0 0.82 continued breastfeeding of children at ages 12–15 100
complementary feeding
and 20–23 months, where 0 = No and 1 = Yes
(and anything in between reflects averages across
years).
The percentage of the WHO’s recommended
Food safety score 73% 50.21% International Health Regulations related to food 69
safety that has been attained.

Source: Own calculations based on ERH database. For further information on each of these scores, please refer to the list of indicators for developing countries
available at: https://endingruralhunger.org/methodology/.

67
Methodological note on the definition and interpretation of Ethiopia’s rankings for its
“enabling policy environment” indicators

Ethiopia’s agricultural, economic, trade, and nutrition policies, as well as its prioritization of FNS,
were evaluated on the extent to which its national policy documents explicitly integrate strategies
to promote an enabling policy environment for achieving FNS and whether the government has
made adequate efforts to implement these strategies. All of the indicators included in Table A1b
(except for the “doing business index” and “food safety score” indicators) are categorical variables
(binary or discrete) representing a score that corresponds with a qualitative description. In the
“Ethiopia” and “Regional (SSA) average” columns of Table A1b, these scores have been
averaged over the study period (2009-2013) to provide a general picture of the country and
region’s performance during this time. Though the indicators were originally constructed as
numeric, categorical variables, the averages from 2009-2013 often include fractions. As seen in
the “Unit of measurement/Score definition” column of Table A1b, Ethiopia’s scores have been
interpreted by rounding scores with fractions to the closest whole number.48

The values of the “Policy strength score (relative to global best practice)” column were drawn from
the Ending Rural Hunger rankings, which use a “distance to the frontier” methodology to compute
how far Ethiopia’s value is relative to global best value. 49 In essence, this indexing methodology
involves transforming each indicator onto a common 0-1 scale by identifying each country’s best
score across the sample years to create a frontier sample. From this sample, the best “frontier”
and the “worst” scores are identified. Then each country score, X, is transformed by the formula
(worst – X)/ (worst – frontier) to generate a score between 0 and 1, which is then multiplied by
100. Scores are averaged over the 2009-2013 period, where available. Furthermore, the “Sub-
Saharan Africa comparison” column shows whether Ethiopia’s score falls between the bottom 10
and top 10 scores within the SSA region.

The construction and interpretation of the score of the variables included in Table A1b is
presented below:

1. Indicators on access to key agricultural inputs such as rural finance, water, land, and
input markets, were collected through the International Fund for Agricultural
Development’s (IFAD) Rural Sector Performance Assessments and constructed as
categorical/qualitative variables ranging between 0 and 6, with 6 indicating the best
performance. Meanwhile, the women’s enabling environment indicators, drawn from
the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s (OECD) Social
Institutions and Gender Index, are indices ranging from 0 to 1, with 0 representing the
greatest parity between men and women and 1 representing the least parity.
2. Rural investment climate indicators again come from the International Fund for
Agricultural Development’s (IFAD) Rural Sector Performance Assessments and are
constructed as categorical/qualitative variables ranging between 0 and 6, with 6 indicating

48 While this method provides a rough snapshot of a policy’s strength over a period of time, more detailed analysis of
the yearly data is needed to determine if the policy quality improved or declined within the time period.
49 For more information on the Ending Rural Hunger project’s application of the distance to the frontier methodology

please see the Ending Rural Hunger: Methodological Note available at: https://endingruralhunger.org/methodology/.

68
 the best performance—except for the doing business index, which is produced by the
World Bank and ranges from 1 to 100, with 100 being the best business environment and
0 being the most restrictive business environment.
3. Nutrition policy indicators are binary scores from the Economist Intelligence Unit’s Global
Food Security Index and the Institute of Development Studies’ Hunger And Nutrition
Commitment Index with 0 indicating no and 1 indicating yes—except for the food safety
score, which is the percentage of the WHO’s recommended International Health
Regulations related to food safety that have been attained.

69
 Table A2: Regional distribution of rural food and nutrition insecurity in Ethiopia

Diet quantity Diet quality Economic vulnerability

Region

Low dietary
>75% of total
Consumption < diversity Below 75% or more of
household Below food
2550 kcal / adult (<=3 food absolute total
calories coming poverty line Rural population
equivalent / day groups over poverty line expenditures
from starch (% of projections (2012)
(% of 7 days) (% (% of on food (% of
staples (% of households)
households) of households) households)
households)
households)

Tigray 44% 61% 25% 29% 33% 2% 3,966,184

Afar 38% 57% 65% 33% 27% 13% 1,389,476
Amhara 51% 36% 41% 24% 38% 3% 16,551,144
Oromia 39% 65% 22% 24% 28% 1% 27,758,658
Somali 40% 46% 43% 27% 22% 6% 4,427,101
Benishangul
37% 35% 19% 24% 30% 3% 849,335
Gumuz
SNNPR 27% 75% 47% 25% 22% 4% 15,619,635
Gambela 30% 60% 35% 25% 19% 10% 288,070
Harari 15% 86% 17% 9% 4% 0% 96,222
Dire Dawa 19% 80% 18% 12% 12% 1% 122,950
Rural 40% 58% 34% 24% 29% 2% 71,146,269
Source: CFSVA 2014, DHS (2011).

70
 Table A3: Regional distribution of child malnutrition in Ethiopia

Weight-for-
Height-for-age height Weight-for-age Any
(stunting, % (wasting, % (underweight, anemia
below 2 SD) below 2 SD) % below 2 SD) (<11.0 g/dl)
Critical threshold
40 15 30 40
(global)
Tigray 51.4 10.3 35.1 37.5
Afar 50.2 19.5 40.2 74.7
Amhara 52 9.9 33.4 35.1
Oromiya 41.4 9.7 26 51.7
Somali 33 22.2 33.5 68.7
Benishangul-Gumuz 48.6 9.9 31.9 46.5
SNNP 44.1 7.6 28.3 36.9
Gambela 27.3 12.5 20.7 50.9
Harari 29.8 9.1 21.5 55.5
Addis Ababa 22 4.6 6.4 33.2
Dire Dawa 36.3 12.3 27.6 62.9
Total 44.4 9.7 28.7 44.2
Source: DHS (2011).

71
 Table A4: Selected targets of GTP I and II

Plan 5-year Plan

Unit of Baseline targets Actual growth targets
Sector indicator measurement 2009/ 10 2014/15 2014/15 performance 2019/20
The macroeconomy
Real GDP growth rate Percent 10.4 11.4 11.4 9.6% 10
Poverty and welfare
Total poverty headcount Percent 29.2 22.2 29.60 1.4% 16.7
Infrastructure development
Roads
All weather road length as a
1000s of km 48.8 64.5 120 145.9% 220
share of total road network
Average time taken to all-
Hours 3.7 1.4 1.5 -59.5% 0.8
weather road
Kilometers per
Road density 44.5 123.7 109 144.9% 200
1000s of km2
Roads in acceptable
Percent 81 86.7 70 -13.6% 80
condition
Area further than 5km from
Percent 64 29 33.6 -47.5% 13.5
all-weather roads
Energy
Electricity coverage Percent 41 75 60 46.3% 90
Telecommunications
Fixed line telephone density Percent 1.36 3.4 10.5 672.1% 54
Mobile telephone
Percent 8.7 45 43.9 404.6% 100
access/distribution
Water
Overall potable water
Percent 68.5 98.5 58 -15.3% 83
coverage
Rural population with
access to potable water Percent 65.8 98 59 -10.3% 85
within 0.5 km
Land developed for medium
and large scale irrigation 2.5 15.6 12.9 416.0% 18.7
schemes
Health
Primary health services
Percent 89 100 94 5.6% 100
coverage
Per 1000
Under-5 mortality rate 101 68 68 -32.7% 30
children
Infant mortality rate Percent 77 31 46.4 -39.7% 19.3

72
 Per 100,000
Maternal mortality rate 590 267 420 -28.8% 199
live births

Births attended by skilled

Percent 25 60 41 64.0% 95
health personnel

Under one year penta 3

Percent 82 96 82 0.0% 96
immunization coverage
Stunting rate Percent 46 37 40 -13.0% 21
Wasting rate Percent 11 3 9.7 -11.8% 4.9
Source: Own calculations based on GTP I and GTP II documents.

73
 Table A5: Mapping FNS-specific targets of GTP 1 with the
Sustainable Development Goals and Malabo Declaration

SDG Targets Malabo Declaration GTP I

Target Objective Target Indicator
Goal 2: By 2030, Sustain Ensure Increase in major Major food crops
double the agricultural food food crops production (in
agricultural GDP growth security production; Increase thousands of tons);
productivity and of at least 6% and in size of land Land covered with
incomes of small- support the covered with major major food crops (in
scale food producers, food food crops thousands of
in particular women, industry by hectares)
indigenous peoples, increasing
family farmers, crop
pastoralists and production
fishers, including Accelerate Increase Increase in major Average food crop
through secure and agricultural crop food crops productivity
equal access to land, growth by at productivity productivity (quintal/hectare)
other productive least doubling by applying
resources and inputs, current good
knowledge, financial agricultural agricultural
services, markets productivity, practices
and opportunities for by the year
value addition and 2025
non-farm
employment
Goal 2: Increase Facilitate Improve Improve natural Total number of
investment, including sustainable agricultural resource extension service
through enhanced and reliable production conservation and beneficiary household
international production and agricultural input ('000)
cooperation, in rural and access to productivity use through
infrastructure, quality and by enhanced extension
agricultural research affordable improving service
and extension inputs extension Improve natural Number of extension
services, technology service resource service beneficiary
development and utilization conservation and female headed
plant and livestock and agricultural input farmers (30 percent)
gene banks in order agricultural use through
to enhance inputs enhanced extension
agricultural service
productive capacity in Enhance extension Number of extension
developing countries, workers training workers specialized
in particular least in agricultural
developed countries products that can be
produced with the
country's agro-
ecological zones and
crops with high value

74
 Increase agricultural Improved seed in
input supply thousands of quintal

Increase agricultural Chemical fertilizer in

input supply tons ('000)
Increase Road density
construction of (kilometers per 1000s
quality road of km2)
infrastructure
Facilitate the Enhance Increase in Cumulative number
supply of agricultural improved of research
appropriate research agricultural research conducted and
knowledge, technology outputs adequate technology
information for increased obtained on crop
and skills to agricultural productivity
users. productivity
Facilitate
suitable,
reliable and
affordable
mechanization
and energy
supply,
among others

75
SDG Targets Malabo Declaration GTP I
Target Objective Target Indicator
Goal 2: By Enhance investments Strengthen Implement Male headed/female
2030, ensure for resilience building natural sustainable headed farmers
sustainable initiatives, including resource land use and certified with first
food social security for rural conservation management level land ownership
production workers and other system certification in
systems and vulnerable social millions
implement groups, as well as for
resilient vulnerable
agricultural ecosystems
practices that Mainstream resilience Implement Male headed/female
increase and risk management sustainable headed farmers
productivity in the policies, land use and certified with second
and strategies and management level land ownership
production, investment plans system certification in
that help millions
maintain Ensure that, by the Implement Number of woredas
ecosystems, year 2025, at least 30 sustainable implementing land
that percent of our farm, land use and administration
strengthen pastoral and fisher management systems
capacity for households are system
adaptation to resilient to climate
climate change and weather
change, related risks
extreme
weather,
drought,
flooding and
other
disasters and
that
progressively
improve land
and soil
quality
Goal 6: By Facilitate efficient and Strengthen Area of land covered
2030, effective water use of water with modern small-
implement management systems resource and scale irrigation in
integrated notably through conservation thousands of hectare
water irrigation
resources
management
at all levels,
including
through
transboundary
cooperation
as appropriate

76
Goal 2 (same Strengthening Improve Increase in Food stock in metric
as above) and strategic food and disaster amount of tons; Contingency
Goal 13: cash reserves to mitigation food reserve budget in thousands
Strengthen respond to food and for disaster of birr
resilience and shortages occasioned management mitigation;
adaptive by Increase
capacity to periodic prolonged budget for
climate- droughts or other disaster
related disasters/emergencies mitigation
hazards and and
natural management
disasters in all
countries Strengthening early Develop Number of woredas
warning systems to system for with disaster
facilitate advanced disaster prevention profile
and proactive prevention
responses to and early
disasters and warning
emergencies with based on
food and nutrition disaster
security implications profile
Targeting priority Extend early Number of people
geographic areas and warning and supported in food
community groups for response items in millions
intervention information
exchange
system to
connect
regions,
woredas and
ware houses
by woreda
net

77
SDG Targets Malabo Declaration GTP I
Target Objective Target Indicator
Goal 1: By Ensure that the Decrease the Ensure food Number of male and
2030, reduce agricultural percentage of security at female headed farmers
at least by half growth and the population the benefiting from
the proportion transformation living below the household voluntary resettlement
of men, process is poverty line level programs
women and inclusive and
children of all contributes at
ages living in least 50 percent
poverty in all to the overall
its dimensions poverty reduction
according to target
national
definitions
Goal 1 (same Support and Ensure food Number of male and
as above) and facilitate security at female headed farmers
Goal 8: By preferential entry the benefiting from
2030, achieve and participation household productive safety net
full and for women and level Number of male and
productive youth in gainful female headed farms
employment and attractive with food insecurity
and decent agri-business problem benefiting from
work for all opportunities family level credit
women and package
men, including Number of male and
for young female headed farmers
people and who graduated from a
persons with safety net program
disabilities,
and equal pay
for work of
equal value
Goal 2: By Improve Ensure Reduction Stunting (percent)
2030, end all nutritional status, Implementation in children
forms of and in particular, of Child malnutrition
malnutrition, the elimination of Nutrition problem
including child under- strategy
achieving, by nutrition in Africa
2025, the with a view to
internationally bringing down Wasting (percent)
agreed targets stunting to 10
on stunting percent and
and wasting in underweight to 5
children under percent by 2025.
5 years of age,
and address
the nutritional
needs of
adolescent

78
 girls, pregnant
and lactating
women and
older persons
Goal 2 (same Reduce child Ensure Neonatal mortality (out
as above) and mortality improved of 1000)
Goal 3: By health
2030, end service
preventable delivery to
deaths of reduce child
newborns and mortality Reduce IMR per 1,000
children under
5 years of age,
with all
countries Reduce under-five
aiming to mortality rate per 1,000
reduce
neonatal
mortality to at
least as low as
12 per 1,000
live births and
under-5
mortality to at
least as low as
25 per 1,000
live births
Source: SDGs, Malabo Declaration, and GTP I documents.

79
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