Improvements in acute food security likely for the Northwest Pastoral Livelihood Zone

• Crisis (IPC Phase 3) food insecurity is expected to persist through December, in Southeastern and Obock Pastoral Zones. Poor consecutive rainy seasons, coupled with anticipated poor livestock production and a decline in labor opportunities, are widening household food deficits. 

• Appreciable improvements in the Karan/Karma rains are anticipated from July-September, improving acute food insecurity from Crisis to Stressed (IPC Phase 2) from September through December in the Northwest Pastoral Livelihood Zone.

• Continued Stressed acute food insecurity is expected for most poor households in Djibouti City’s urban areas through December. However, the food voucher program for vulnerable households (from July through September covering Ramadan and the Eid), in addition to humanitarian and food assistance programs, should improve household access to food. 

Poor households in the Northwest are expected to experience marked improvement in food security because recent rains coupled with improved infrastructure for preservation of grazing resources will sustain household food security through improved livestock production and concomitant provision of labor opportunities. Although availability of pasture and browse will likely result in improved milk production and livestock productivity and value, herd sizes are about a quarter as large as usual to fully support household food security. Some localized northwestern areas have received poor rains, such as the Yoboki sector (Allouli and Moutrous localities). Nevertheless, acute food insecurity for poor households in the Northwest will improve to Stressed (IPC Phase 2) through the outlook period in December.

WFP food assistance will continue to target 60 to 80 percent of the population in rural areas, despite an incomplete food basket (currently 600 MT compared to the seasonal normal of 1100 MT) from August through October. This will likely further compound poor nutrition given that Global Acute Malnutrition rates are already greater than 20 percent in most regions. However, toward the end of Ramadan, distributions of specific food provisions were targeted to poor households by government authorities in partnership with religious organizations. About 21,000 households across the country benefited, the vast majority obtaining double rations in July. It is likely that the increase in coverage will mitigate further deterioration in food security until September.

Southeastern (Border side) and Obock pastoral areas

After a weak Diraac/Soughoum season, followed by the longer May to September dry season, pastoral households in the Southeast border area and rural Obock region are experiencing Crisis (IPC Phase 3) acute food insecurity, likely persisting through December. The current Karan/Karma rainfall season is not significant in alleviating these dry conditions for southeastern pastoralists; therefore further reduction in milk availability and deterioration in livestock production and value is expected, consistent with the ongoing decline in grazing resources. Poor households continue to share food with cattle at the expense of their own consumption to improve livestock productivity. This recently adopted survival strategy, especially in the Southeast, demonstrates that affected households are compensating for seasonally low labor demand/income and their food gaps using methods that are harmful in the short to medium term. In spite of ongoing food assistance, households in these areas are likely to remain in Crisis stemming from poor rainfall, cumulative loss of livestock, and a decline in traditional coping strategies (charcoal and remittances).

Poor urban households, predominately in Balbala, Djibouti City

In urban areas, food insecurity is driven by a lack of labor opportunities, and prices of food commodities and kerosene remaining at elevated though stable levels. Wage earners supply less labor during the summer, such as construction and port operations, which are normally scarce until September. Food purchasing capacities of poor urban households remain low during this period of the year, due to high expenditures during Ramadan and anticipated school expenses in September. However, interventions by partners and the government, through food voucher programs in the most vulnerable areas in Balbala, have somewhat helped mitigate the impact of these shocks. The vast majority of urban households constituting 55 percent of the country’s population will likely expect Stressed acute food insecurity through December. A few very poor urban households constituting less than 20 percent of the urban population will likely be in Crisis, through September.