Too many of the 250 million people of the West Africa region continue to live under high levels of vulnerability largely due to the devastating consequences of two decades of complex emergencies and natural disasters. The socio-economic landscape of West Africa is quickly emerging as a growing threat to peace and security in the region, with extreme poverty and half of its population living below the poverty line. While some countries have seen sustained economic growth in recent years, the uneven distribution of national income has meant that this growth has led more to inequality and increasing marginalisation of segments of the population than to poverty reduction. The region also has the world’s lowest human development indicators, severely impeding its achievement of the Millennium Development Goals.
Seriously aggravating West Africa’s economic plight is the soaring cost of fuel and basic goods. The dramatic rise over the past twelve months in global food prices poses a threat to food security and nutrition and creates a host of humanitarian, human rights, socio-economic, environmental, developmental, political and security-related challenges. The food crisis endangers millions of vulnerable people in West Africa and threatens to reverse gains made towards reducing hunger and malnutrition since the past few years.
In view of this context, regional humanitarian partners decided during the West Africa Consolidated Appeal Process (CAP) workshop held in Dakar on 10 to 11 September 2008 to focus the 2009 West Africa CAP on the consequences of the food crisis in four priority areas for humanitarian action:
· Food Security and Nutrition;
· Health;
· Protection and Population Movements;
· Water, Sanitation and Hygiene.
For 2009, a fifth sector (Coordination/ Information Management/ Support Services) has been added to the priority sectors as it was felt that communication, information-sharing and cross-sector analysis were crucial to achieve a coherent and coordinated response.
Over the years, the West Africa CAP has become a system-wide regional humanitarian framework for stronger collaboration between key actors actively addressing human suffering in one of the poorest regions in the world. Increased commitment at all levels to seeking out the most useful and efficient ways forward for cost efficient, flexible and strategically guided solutions is reflected in the growing engagement and pro-active participation of agencies, donors and West African Governmental structures in the process.
Addressing the challenges that lie ahead for 2009 will take continued commitment, not only from the donor community, but from all stakeholders to follow through on strategic monitoring and ensuring that four main initiatives are upheld. The four main initiatives are: early notice of impeding crises; further strengthening of preparedness and facilitation of joint programming and response; sharpening evidence-based advocacy; and sustaining policy dialogue with non-humanitarian partners.
This year’s Consolidated Appeal for West Africa – which includes projects for the countries of Benin, Burkina Faso, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Togo, as well as projects with a regional context – consist of 86 projects from UN and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) for a total of US$361 million.
2009 Appeal