US embassy cable - 03ROME4927

UNCLAS  ROME 004927 
 
SIPDIS 
 
 
AIDAC 
 
FROM U.S. MISSION IN ROME 
 
AMEMBASSY LUSAKA FOR CHARGE D'AFFAIRES MOZENA, DHANANI, AND 
USAID ACTING DIRECTOR GUNTHER 
USAID FOR DCHA/D/FFP LANDIS, AA/DCHA WINTER 
STATE FOR PRM KNUDSEN AND LANGE, IO/AS HOLMES, IO/EDA 
USDA/FAS FOR CHAMBLISS AND GAINOR 
USMISSION GENEVA FOR USAID/KYLOH 
USDA/FAS PRETORIA FOR HELM 
NSC FOR JDWORKEN 
 
E.O.  12958:  N/A 
TAGS: EAID, AORC, PREF, EAGR, ZA, WFP, UN, UNHCR 
SUBJECT: WFP'S FINELY TARGETED AND WELL-RUN OPERATIONS IN 
ZAMBIA 
 
REF: VATICAN 00504 
 
----------- 
Summary 
----------- 
 
1. A representative from the US Mission to the UN Agencies 
for Food and Agriculture, Philip Lamade, visited Zambia from 
September 16 - 23, 2003 to assess WFP's operations, finding 
its operations appropriately targeted and well run.  End 
summary. 
 
----------- 
Background 
----------- 
 
2. Zambia had a disastrous economic performance during the 
1990s with an average annual real GDP growth rate of about 
0.6 (according to World Bank) percent while the sub-Saharan 
Africa averaged 2.4 percent. Zambia's economy is dependent 
on copper and cobalt production for over 60 percent of its 
total exports.  The average international copper price fell 
from US Dollars (USD) 1.19/lb in 1990 to 0.70/lb in 2002; 
during the same period copper production fell from 422,000 
tons to 338,000 tons. 
 
3. In the 1990s, hyperinflation combined with currency 
devaluation eroded the purchasing power of household 
incomes and worsened Zambia's food security situation and 
poverty rate.  Consequently, the country is now among the 
poorest in the world with a per capita income of USD 337 in 
2002, ranking it 153 of 173 countries on UNDP's Human 
Development Index 2002. Over 60 percent of the population 
lives on the equivalent of USD 1 or less per day. 
 
4. About one year ago Zambia was in the midst of a food 
security crisis induced by erratic rains and government 
policies that discouraged food production.  Despite severe 
food shortages that put nearly 3 million people at risk of 
serious hunger or worse, the Government of the Republic of 
Zambia (GRZ) rejected U.S.-donated relief maize because it 
could not be certified as free of genetically modified 
organisms, and Ambassador Hall chastised GRZ officials for 
risking mass starvation.  Today, while maize production has 
bounced back to adequate levels, recently concluded food 
security assessments indicate that pockets of vulnerable 
populations remain. 
 
----------- 
WFP Operations 
----------- 
 
5. Under its emergency operation, WFP distributes food aid 
to the most vulnerable groups.  Including orphans and 
vulnerable children, beneficiaries will peak at 480,000 in 
early 2004, requiring 48,000 metric tons of relief 
commodities.  According to the June 2003 Special Report of 
the FAO/WFP Crop and Food Supply Assessment Mission to 
Zambia, last year WFP staved off distress and protected 
household and productive assets, although it was able to 
provide substantially less than the recommended kilocalories 
per person per day. 
 
6. WFP's country program, a 5-year development program 
through 2006, aims to provide 65,000 tons of commodities to 
595,000 beneficiaries under the following core activities: 
food for assets, school feeding, supplementary feeding, and 
support to HIV/AIDS affected households. 
 
7. Although Zambia has been home to Angolan refugees for 30 
years, presently more than 200,000, WFP's protracted relief 
and recovery operation (PRRO) supports only about 113,620 
refugees mostly from Angola and the Democratic Republic of 
the Congo.  The GRZ has generously provided arable land to 
 
 
refugees as part of a self-reliance strategy.  Accordingly, 
WFP has been able to move from relief food distribution to 
targeted feeding as beneficiaries have become more self- 
sufficient in food production. 
 
8. The PRRO is slated for renewal through December 2005. 
Meanwhile, by a tripartite agreement among Zambia, Angola 
and UNHCR, the UNHCR started a voluntary repatriation 
program for Angolan refugees in July this year.  About 
20,000 refugees are expected to go home by the end of 2003, 
and another 40,000 next year.  Under the new PRRO beginning 
in January, WFP will assume responsibility for managing food 
distribution to recipients, a responsibility currently 
undertaken by UNHCR. 
 
----------- 
Tea Parties and Travels 
----------- 
 
9. Upon arrival in Lusaka, US Mission Rome representative 
Philip Lamade met US Embassy Lusaka Charge d'Affaires Dan 
Mozena, Political/Economic Section Chief Katherine Dhanani, 
and WFP Country Director Richard Ragan.  Mozena also hosted 
a tea attended by Father Peter Henriot of the Jesuit Center 
for Theological Reflection.  Henriot had opposed last year 
Zambia's accepting U.S.-donated relief maize because it 
contained genetically modified organisms (GMOs). 
 
Note: In August 2002 the JCTR praised the GRZ's decision to 
reject U.S. relief maize, and Father Henriot stated that it 
would be better for some Zambians to starve to death than to 
risk destroying the future of Zambian agriculture.  Even 
before and perhaps influencing the GRZ's decision, the JCTR 
prevaricated by going on record at a town meeting that the 
U.S. was able to provide non-GMO maize despite knowing that 
non-GMO and GMO maize are intermixed.  Per referenced 
telegram, in January 2003, the U.S. Mission to the Holy See 
hosted a seminar on sustainable agriculture in the 
developing world in order to provide a clear sense of the 
potential for biotechnology for food and for more efficient 
agricultural development.  Afterwards some African panelists 
noted that while Europe is by far Africa's largest 
agricultural export market, European governments are 
preventing economic advancement in Africa by threatening to 
block African biotech products.  End note. 
 
10. Henriot remains concerned that GMOs threaten Zambian 
agricultural export opportunities, but he is not concerned 
about biotech food as a health hazard.  Despite fundamental 
differences in views about GMOs, cordial discussions 
predominated with Henriot's expostulation of the Center's 
many fine humanitarian and other activities. 
 
11. The following day Lamade visited the Bethany Community 
School, an orphans and vulnerable children center supported 
by WFP and its implementing partner, Project Concern 
International.  About 694 children attend grades 1 through 7 
at Bethany and receive protein-enriched porridge daily.  In 
addition, 523 households receive a household ration; a 
skills center provides training in tailoring, shoe making 
and repairing; and the residential center houses 15 boys 
ranging in age from 7 to 16. 
 
12. An Embassy-sponsored lunch encouraged a lively 
conversation with two representatives from the Biotechnology 
Outreach Society of Zambia who spoke in positive terms about 
the benefits of biotechnology and mentioned the growing 
interest among Zambian policy-makers to develop an 
appropriate policy framework about GMOs. 
 
13. Lamade inspected a WFP-operated warehouse in Ndola, 
finding it orderly and run by knowledgeable staff.  Stock in 
the warehouse included 60,000 Humanitarian Daily Rations 
(HDRs), recently donated by the Department of Defense forNANI, AND 
USAID ACTING DIRECTOR GUNTHER 
USAID FOR DCHA/D/FFP LANDIS, AA/DCHA WINTER 
STATE FOR PRM KNUDSEN AND LANGE, IO/AS HOLMES, IO/EDA 
USDA/FAS FOR CHAMBLISS AND GAINOR 
USMISSION GENEVA FOR USAID/KYLOH 
USDA/FAS PRETORIA FOR HELM 
 
repatriating Angolan refugees. 
 
14. During a two-day visit to the Northwestern Province 
Lamade visited a WFP supplementary feeding program for 
TB/HIV/AIDS patients at the Makulu Health Center, Kabwe. 
WFP and UNHCR personnel provided a briefing and a tour of 
the Meheba refugee camp. 
 
15. Lunch with WFP implementing partners included one 
humanitarian daily ration (HDR) sampled by the curious. 
Following lunch was a tour of community gardens, fish 
farming, and furniture manufacturing enterprises conducted 
by WFP implementing partners. 
 
16. During a later visit to the Southern Province, Lamade 
visited a school-feeding program at the Bbakasa Basic School 
in Siavonga.  The school, founded in 1946 by Salvation Army 
Missionaries, had closed and was only re-opened in 1982 
after the area was cleared of land mines.  Today it has an 
enrollment of about 264 children through grade 4 and is 
supported by the GRZ's Ministry of Education and WFP. 
 
17. Acting USAID Director Helen Gunther described WFP's 
operations as complementary to the work of the Consortium 
for Southern Africa Food Security Emergency (C-SAFE). 
C-SAFE's activities are neither exclusively emergency nor 
development oriented.  Like C-SAFE, WFP works along the 
entire relief-to-development continuum by addressing the 
immediate nutritional needs of finely targeted vulnerable 
groups, building assets, and teaching communities how to 
resist future food security shocks.  In other words, for 
both WFP and C-SAFE, food aid is used as an incentive for 
targeted households to invest time and resources in asset 
creation and rehabilitation. 
 
18. Two recent vulnerability assessments, the WFP/UNHCR 
joint food assessment mission of 15 January to 5 February 
2003, and the "Zambia Baseline Survey Report of Findings," 
September 2003, sponsored by the Consortium for Southern 
Africa Food Security Emergency (C-SAFE), confirm the 
necessity for targeted food aid in Zambia. 
 
----------- 
US Mission Conclusions 
----------- 
 
19. Lamade found that WFP Zambia's operations are 
appropriately tailored for people who do not have access to 
food because of their economic circumstances. 
 
20. WFP's operations are strikingly varied and include 
creating and preserving assets such as harvesting 
infrastructure, natural resource conservation, skills 
upgrading, sanitary works, and aquaculture. 
 
21. WFP's collaborators, World Vision, CARE, and Catholic 
Relief Services (which are also the C-SAFE NGOs), Lutheran 
World Federation, Medicins Sans Frontiers, Jesuit Refugee 
Services, Assistance to Aid Refugees, and many other local 
NGOs provide a mosaic of important developmental activities 
to ensure that refugees are not merely surviving but are 
engaged in self-sustaining livelihoods. 
 
22. WFP's food assistance efforts in Zambia are effectively 
reaching a carefully targeted population.  US Mission/Rome 
will confer with WFP Headquarters on expanding donor 
support, particularly to facilitate the recent extension of 
WFP's PRRO for refugee repatriation. 
 
23. US Mission/Rome greatly appreciates the excellent 
support provided by US Embassy Lusaka to its 
representative.  Hall 
 
 
NNNN 
 2003ROME04927 - Classification: UNCLASSIFIED