Mauritania Summary of Food Security Outlook

• The national survey conducted by the Commissariat de la Sécurité Alimentaire (CSA) and the World Food Program conducted in December every year suggests close to 600,000 food-insecure people country-wide. This is only 2 percent higher than the five-year average for this survey and 16 percent below the initial FEWS NET projection for this period. 

• Malnutrition rates measured by the Ministry of Health and UNICEF in December 2011 are consistent with prior year averages.

• Traditional cereal prices are high compared to the five-year average for the post-harvest period. However, high substitution, especially for wheat or local rice, is observed. Market supply of these products is normal with relatively affordable prices.

• In zones where poor households depend on rain-fed agriculture(south and northwest of the agro-pastoral zone), income is insufficient to cover the additional demand for cereal purchase, since production was only 40-60 percent of the average, and market prices are higher than last year. Technically appropriate and well-targeted assistance will be necessary to support these households between February and September 2012. 

• Irregular, poor rains resulted in a 50 percent decrease in cereal production compared to the previous year, and a 40 percent decrease compared to the average of the last five years, with the worst results in the rain-fed agricultural production zone. Even in a typical year, Mauritania imports about 70 percent of its cereal needs (sorghum from Mali and Senegal, rice and wheat from international markets). Additional imports required to meet human consumption needs will be approximately 15-17 percent more than normal.
• Given poor grazing conditions, the use of imported sorghum and wheat as livestock feed is competing with human consumption. From now until September, national demand for imported cereals (especially sorghum and wheat) is expected to be 20 to 25 percent higher than national demand in a typical year.
• Traders are able to meet demand with their stocks despite a notable reduction in border market supply, which are affected by production decreases in bordering countries and policies restricting exports imposed by administrative authorities and some communities.
• Domestic cereal market flows are operating relatively well in all zones where people have regular access to the administrative center, which is a key market for obtaining food.  These livelihood zones are in the center and south, where the majority of the country’s population is concentrated, and are supplied from Nouakchott, which is the country’s principal commercial distribution center.
• In more remote and isolated zones (Aftout, Affolé), market flows are much more directed toward regional capitals then toward departmental capitals. Increasingly, households are relying on migration and in-kind remittances of cereals provided by other family members residing in Nouakchot, Nouadhibou, Zouerate, etC). This has resulted in a general reduction of market purchase for food, which otherwise would constitute the only food source once households have exhausted their reserves.
• The price of sorghum, which experienced atypical increases during the harvest period (September to December), remained relatively stable or decreased in January and February in all markets in the supply chain (Figure 4). Therefore, the use of wheat in place of sorghum by households in the rainfed agricultural production zone is due to relatively high seasonal prices, rather than lack of market supply.  
• Local rice prices remain within the typical 10-20 percent below the price of imported rice, relatively similar to those from last year. The price of imported wheat has remained stable since October-November 2010, but shows more monthly fluctuations, correlating to sorghum price trends.

Normally, between March and September, prices should begin to rise, with increases determined by fuel price increases (already 10% more compared to January 2012), the implementation of assistance programs, and government capacity to minimize trader speculation. Given the dynamic nature of Mauritanian commerce, commercial reserves should remain steady.  However, constraints limiting access to foreign currency could limit the ability to meet cumulative cereal demand required for both for human and animal consumption in the timeframe required.

The populations most affected by this situation are poor households in rain-fed agricultural production zone, and those in the center and west of the agro-pastoral zone. Additionally, increasing prices are affecting populations in the Senegal River Valley where flood-recession dependent crop production was mediocre, and populations in the Transhumant Pastoralism zone, and south of the Oases and Pastoralism with Wadi Cultivation zone where poor grazing conditions affected milk production and caused a drop in animal prices.

Household food reserves were approximately 50 percent of the average in zones practicing rain-fed agriculture, which only meets food needs for three to four months in a normal year.

• Markets will remain the food supply centers for populations until September, but access to imported products remains in doubt starting in February. Income from agricultural work (between 5 and 20 percent of annual income, depending on the zones) has experienced seasonal drops of nearly 50 percent compared to typical levels, while prices of food commodities are, when compared to the same period in 2011, either stable (sugar, wheat) or increasing by 20 to 50 percent (rice, oil, sorghum).
• Poor households have developed coping strategies focused on reinforcement of migratory displacement (sending several family members), skipping meals (especially in the Aftout) and increasing the sale of animals despite price decreases (agro-pastoral zone).

Pastoral Conditions

• Pastoral conditions are mediocre in all livelihood zones.
• Livestock markets, already well supplied, will remain well supplied until July. Current prices for cattle are dropping across all markets (between 20 and 50 percent compared to January 2011) with an emphasis on milk cows, especially in the west and center of the agro-pastoral zone and in the Tranhumant Pastoralist zone, consistent with typical trends following the Muslim new year, the birthday of the Prophet Mohamed and of the Magal de Touba. 
• Livestock supply, especially of cattle, will likely drop due to the intensification of seasonal migration and the additional initiation of the government assistance program targeting pastoralists in the February-July 2012 period. Cattle-price increases should begin in the early phases of this assistance program and should continue through September.

Government Assistance Plan

• The government has a MRO 45 billion program to assist targeted populations from March to September 2012. Currently, approximately MRO 12 billion has been mobilized to support the program launch in the near term. The program is organized into the following components:

Food for Human Consumption

• Restocking 50 percent of village-level food security reserves (SAVS), comprising a total of 44,340 tons of wheat, 29,560 tons of sugar, and 11,824 tons of oils.  Per SAV, this is equivalent to  3 tons of wheat, 2 tons of sugar and 800 liters of oil per month for eight months (February-September), the peak of the intervention period.
• Free distribution benefitting 109,857 vulnerable households with a monthly ration of 50 kg of cereal and 4 liters of oil for five months.
• Reinforcement of Nutrition and Health Centers.
• Continuation of the “Boutiques de solidarité” operation for an eight-month period in 2012; with an understanding that communities outside of administrative centers will be covered by the SAVS assistance component. Monthly food needs outside of Nouakchott are estimated to be 1.824 tons of rice, 2.022 tons of sugar, 1.011 of food pasta and 1.011 tons of oils for 329 shops in the country.

Support to Pastoralists

• Assistance to livestock is planned through the acquisition of large quantities of livestock feed, either from local producers or through imports. The objective is to provide affordable maintenance rations to livestock producers to enable livestock to survive through the lean period without sustaining serious deterioration in body conditions. The expected daily ration will be 2 kg for cattle and camels and 0.5 kg for sheep and goats.  Rations will be available for six months for cattle and sheep, and for 3 months for camels and goats. Distributions are underway as of February.

These two main components are further supported by animal health improvement programs as well as village and pastoral hydraulics.  Free distributions began in February, carried out by the Commissariat de la Sécurité Alimentaire (CSA) but the implementation of other components is pending, thus forcing poor and average households to develop negative coping strategies.

Rain-fed cultivation zone in the southeast of the country

• Probable price stability until March and an increase of 20 to 25 percent of current prices between March and September.
• Millet and sorghum prices in January 2012 are approximately 50 percent higher than those in January 2011 on the Nara market, which is one of the principal supply centers for Mauritanian cereal producers.
• Informal barriers to Malian cereal imports (especially sorghum) are about double those of last year. Although this increases price levels in Mauritania more quickly than in Mali, the price differences between sorghum producing zones and those in consuming zones is not higher than normal, demonstrating that market supply is not yet significantly affected by these disruptions.
• Poor households have intensified seasonal displacement, doubling at the same time the number of people who leave as well as lengthening the displacement period from three months to nine months. Even if income of laborers individually falls below 50 percent due to the increased supply and the reduction of days worked, (below average harvests), this increased displacement is increasing household income by more than 200 percent.
• 2010/11 grazing conditions allowed for good reproduction, but 2011/12 grazing conditions (pasture and water) are the worst in the last five years. Prices of cattle and sheep are respectively more than -20 and approximately 7 percent below the January 2011 level, which means that in order to make the same income from this source (approximately 5 percent in a typical year), pastoralists must sell more animals.
• A deterioration of current household food security is expected between June and September due to commodity access constraints (low income level) despite the good level of supply in the markets.
• The large majority of Mauritanian animals (approximately 75 percent) have been sent to seasonal migration early; and remaining pastoralists have already developed mechanisms to access livestock feed.
• The implementation of the government assistance plan might limit the deterioration of the current food security crisis, but is unlikely to significantly reduce the intensity of this crisis.  However the general impact of measures taken country-wide will minimize the impact of this crisis on the 700,000 people identified in the FEWS NET analysis.
• The reigning climate of insecurity in the area is resulting in a massive number of incoming refugees (already 23 thousand refugees in Mauritania).  Similar to the crisis in the 1990’s, this situation will result an increase of food demand while the local market supply networks are disrupted by military insecurity in the eastern part of the zone.

The Agro-Pastoral Zone

• In a normal year, poor households in this zone cover 30 percent of their food needs from their own production. They purchase 35 percent of their requirements and borrow approximately 20 percent. Twenty percent of income in a typical year comes from the sale of crops, 15 percent from agricultural work, and 40 percent comes from remittances and other displacement activities. The sale of animals provides 5 percent and contributions from wild food gathering are approximately 10 percent.
• This year, large deficits recorded in sorghum production, the principal cereal consumed in the zone (-74 percent compared to 2010 and -67 percent compared to the average of the last five years), requires households to engage in market purchase to meet 85 percent of their food because the shares of borrowing in kind (20 percent) from other households cannot be met. Households will not be able to count on borrowing from local traders, which will likely decrease and include higher repayment rates than in a typical year, where they were around between 50 and 100% of the borrowed volume.
• The supply of wheat to markets as a food to replace sorghum is currently sufficient to meet additional demand for people and animals.
• Due to increased import costs and transportation prices (which doubled between 2010 and January 2012), and competition from solidarity shops in urban administrative centers, traders are no longer able to maintain their former import levels. Normal supply systems have changed with the direct supply of traders in rural zones from markets in regional capitals, and the abandonment of department-level semi-wholesale in order to reduce transportation and product costs.
• Households will lack income normally earned from crop sales as well as a portion of income earned through agricultural labor. Although the daily wage rose by 50 percent compared to last year, poor households are experiencing a drop in their income from the sale of agricultural labor of approximately 40 percent due to reduced demand and fewer days worked. Income as a result of displacement is dropping by 60 percent, but a portion of this deficit is reduced by shipments of food remittances, especially in the center of the zone.
• Given the sorghum production deficit and the high cost of rice, poor households have resorted to the consumption of wheat, which has a lower price and is relatively more available than other cereals. If, as in 2011, one work day enabled the household to buy ten kilograms of wheat, the reduction of working days (2 instead of 4) means that the household will have only 75 percent of its purchasing capacity. While awaiting the beginning of the agricultural season in July, income related to casual labor will continue to drop while the trend of increasing food commodity prices will continue.
• Terms of trade are unfavorable to livestock sellers and are in constant flux since September 2011 where from MRO 19,500, the price of the average sheep fell to less than 16,000, while prices for rice, sorghum and wheat (a substitution grain) are rising (+ 10 percent for sorghum) or remained stable (rice and wheat).
• The fact that agro-dominant households have been restricting meals (one meal a day) since January when this normally happens in May-June indicates the difficulties poor households are having in obtaining food properly. Internal solidarity systems (borrowing of cereals and other commodities) continue with the same intensity, but the volumes are clearly smaller than during previous lean periods.
• Currently, outside of solidarity shops, no new external response has been implemented.

Critical information gaps

• The government assistance program assumes that all people in need of assistance demonstrate the same severity of food insecurity, although poor households in the rain-fed crop cultivation and agro-pastoral zones are the most affected.