The compounded impacts of the previous season cause continued food insecurity

Despite the late start to the rainy season, cereal production is 14 percent above the 5-year average which indicates an improved cereal availability for poor households affected by a more difficult 2015 lean season (June to September 2015).

This year’s cereal production surpluses will enable near-average household incomes. In addition, favorable pastoral conditions, regular cross-border trade flows with neighboring countries, and supplies of imported basic foodstuffs at stable prices will reinforce adequate food access in the majority of the country. As a result, most poor households will be in Minimal (IPC Phase 1) food insecurity.

The locust situation remains calm, but strong rains recorded in northwest Mauritania during the month of October will maintain favorable ecological conditions for locust reproduction for at least the next six month, according to the FAO Emergency Centre for Locust Operations. In addition, the OFDA ETOP report noted that the presence of hopper bands in central Mauritania and mature adults in several locations suggests that breeding has already begun in the northwest. These conditions pose a threat to upcoming harvests, including for flood recession crops (walo).

A situation of Stress (IPC Phase 2) will persist in the agropastoral zone (departments of Moudjéria, Monguel, Tidjikdja, M’Bout, M’Bagne, Magta-Lahjar, Boghé, Bababé, Aleg, Boumdeid, Barkéol, and Kaédi) where the decline in livestock numbers and seasonal births is reducing milk production. This, compounded with the reimbursement of debts contracted during previous lean seasons, will cause households to forgo essential non-food spending until at least March.

In the center of the rainfed crop zone (departments of Amourj and Diguent), the delayed harvests of long and short cycle crops, caused by the rainy season’s late start, prolonged the lean season significantly. Although average production levels are expected, the income generated from these harvests will not cover all the non-food needs of poor households who are more indebted than usual this year because of previously challenging years. These households will remain in Stress (IPC Phase 2) food insecurity until at least March.

For more detailed analysis, see the Food Security Outlook for October 2015 to March 2016.