No . 92 2007 Linking Emergency Response to Need in “ Food Emergencies ”

Editors The MSU International Development Paper series is designed to further the comparative analysis of international development activities in Africa, Latin America, Asia, and the Near East. The papers report research findings on historical, as well as contemporary, international development problems. The series includes papers on a wide range of topics, such as alternative rural development strategies; nonfarm employment and small scale industry; housing and construction; farming and marketing systems; food and nutrition policy analysis; economics of rice production in West Africa; technological change, employment, and income distribution; computer techniques for farm and marketing surveys; farming systems and food security research. The papers are aimed at teachers, researchers, policy makers, donor agencies, and international development practitioners. Selected papers will be translated into French, Spanish, or other languages. Michigan State University agrees to and does hereby grant to the United States Government a royalty-free, non-exclusive and irrevocable license throughout the world to use, duplicate, disclose, or dispose of this publication in any manner and for any purposes and to permit others to do so. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Special thanks to Will Whelan for extensive interactions on earlier versions of this paper and for keeping his eye always on speaking clearly to those grappling with real world decisions about these issues. As always, this work builds on years of collaboration with our African colleagues throughout southern and eastern Africa. v EXECUTIVE SUMMARY When an emergency occurs, agencies must make quick decisions on how to help people facing severe food insecurity. This paper addresses the challenges of designing appropriate responses that are linked to identified needs of affected households and individuals. The primary goal of any response is to save lives now and protect the food security of households and individuals now and in the future. However, instrumental goals and the specific means of achieving them are varied, and must be responsive to the setting in which the emergency occurs. The paper conceives the costs and benefits of a response as the product of how efficiently a resource is delivered (resource transfer efficiency) and the effectiveness of the resource and its mode of delivery in achieving the objectives of the response (resource use efficiency). Those designing emergency response operations need to focus on the combination of these efficiencies, not just on one of them. Policy change is frequently one of the most efficient responses to food security emergencies, with low budgetary costs and potentially …