(2023-07) WFP VAM Bulletin, Quarter 2 2023: Food Security Analysis

HAITI July 2023 WFP VAM Bulletin| Q2 2023 Food security analysis Key Points After having reached a peak in terms of food insufficiency nationwide in April (prevalence of 71%), which was lean season, the situation has improved slightly at the end of quarter 2 of 2023 - as harvesting has begun - but remains alarmingly high, more specifically in the West, Nippes, South and North-West départements, according to values of food security indicators. Prices for basic food commodities dropped at the end of quarter 2 of 2023, for the first time after a long period of increase. However, those prices remain very high compared to the same period a year ago. A significant delay in the onset of the rainy season, combined with prolonged rainfall deficits throughout the current season, has led to fears of abnormally low agricultural performances in 2023. According to WFP survey data, nearly 10% of households are estimated to have received a humanitarian assistance in the second quarter of 2023, nationwide (5% for food assistance). Situation Update The food situation in Haiti continues to be strongly impacted by the country's socioeconomic and security contexts: at the end of quarter 2 of 2023, there was a slight drop in the food security indicators collected by the WFP's continuous survey system (p. 2), which may be linked with the timing of the year (end of the lean season and start of early crops harvesting). At the same time, there was a decline in market prices throughout the country, and a drop in the number of violent events (after reaching a peak in insecurity in April) (p. 3). The aggregation of WFP survey data over a six-month period helps identify the most vulnerable communes within each department, and to study the profiles of the most vulnerable households (p. 4). Finally, a study of seasonal rainfall conditions, whose values are globally below average for this quarter (p. 5) brings possible difficulties in terms of upcoming agricultural production for the current season, particularly in the West, Grande'Anse and Centre départements. WFP RAM 1 WFP VAM Bulletin Quarter 2 2023 Haiti Food security analysis [A] : a slight improvement in the second quarter of 2023 as lean season ends The percentage of households with insufficient food consumption has slightly dropped along the second quarter of 2023, according to the WFP's continuous monitoring system. In April, 71% of households were estimated to have a poor or borderline food consumption score (FCS) (MarchApril corresponding to the lean season). In subsequent months, this percentage fell to 64% in June 2023 (May corresponding to the mango harvest period, June to the start of early crops harvests): that is around 7.7 million people with insufficient food consumption in Haiti this month. One year before, in June 2022, this percentage was 42% (see Fig. 1). The départements of West, Nippes, South and North -West show the highest prevalence of food insufficiency in the country (66% to 69%) (Fig. 2). As at the national level, trends are generally downward, except in South, Artibonite and North départements, where the situation did not improve at the end of the quarter. 7.7m JUNE 2023 -0.46M DECREASE FROM 3 months AGO PEOPLE* with insufficient food consumption in June 2023 -0.20M DECREASE FROM 1 month AGO Insufficient food consumption (FCS : Poor or Borderline) Fig. 1. Monthly trend (in % of households) of insufficient food consumption in Haiti from June 2022 to June 2023 Fig. 2. Prevalence (in % of households) of insufficient food consumption in Haiti as of June 2023 * Please note that these numbers of people with insufficient food consumption are not comparable with IPC food insecure figures (refer to methodology section). Besides, the percentage of households using emergency or crisis coping strategies is on the rise nationwide, reaching 63% in June 2023 (versus 60% in April, and 54% in February), which is approximately as high as the percentage of households having an insufficient FCS that same month. In the Port-au-Prince metropolitan area (ZM-PAP), 1.6 million people (around 70% of households) had insufficient food consumption in June 2023, compared with 75% at the start of the same quarter (Fig. 3). This globally positive trend, in line with the national one, does not, however, concern the communes of Carrefour and Croix-des-Bouquets, which, along with Cité-Soleil, were the most severely affected in the metropolitan area as of June 2023, with prevalence rates of food insufficiency between 72% and 84%. PAP Focus sur la zone métropolitaine de Port-au-Prince 1.6m PEOPLE* with insufficient food consumption in June 2023 in ZM-PAP -0.13M DECREASE FROM JUNE 2023 3 months AGO FROM = QUASi-stable 1 month AGO Insufficient food consumption (FCS : Poor or Borderline) Fig. 3. Monthly trend (in % of households) of insufficient food consumption in ZMPAP from June 2022 to June 2023 Fig. 4. Prevalence (in % of households) of insufficient food consumption in ZM-PAP as of June 2023 Source : WFP, Geopoll/HungerMapLIVE (June 2023) 2 WFP VAM Bulletin Quarter 2 2023 Haiti Market food prices [B] : a slight decline since April-May against a backdrop of high inflation General price trends for basic food commodities in Haitian markets are upward in the second quarter of 2023, compared with 2022. For example, local rice, widely consumed in Haiti, rose from 558 to 898 HTG between April 2022 and April 2023: an increase of over 60% in one year. The same applies to other products, such as wheat flour (110%), ground corn (93%) and sugar (74%): their prices have almost doubled in barely a year. However, by the end of the 2nd quarter of 2023, prices dropped for all these products: between April and May 2023, prices fell by around -8% for most commodities, except for flour (-15%), and for sugar and sorghum, of which decreases were less significant. While these prices are still very high compared with the previous year, these falls are taking place against a backdrop of severe inflation that has lasted for many months, making the situation of Haitian households extremely difficult. Monitoring these prices over the coming months will help to assess whether this trend is to continue over time. Besides, according to the WFP's ALPS (Alert for Price Spikes) classification, all main markets across Haiti (Gonaïves, Hinche, Jérémie, Cap-Haïtien, Ouanaminthe, Port-de-Paix, Les Cayes, Jacmel and Croix des Bossales) are classified as being in crisis for most products. Price (in HTG) Fig. 5. Market price trends for basic food commodities in Haiti from January 2022 to May 2023 Sources : FEWSNET/CNSA, analyzed by WFP-VAM (2023) Security situation [C] : a spike in violence in April in the Port-au-Prince metropolitan area At the start of the second quarter of 2023, the security situation continued to deteriorate, with the number of violent events and fatalities reaching a peak in April 2023 (over 400 killed in violence concentrated mainly in various districts of the capital), before declining in the following months (Fig. 6). The map (Fig. 7) illustrates how these security incidents are distributed across the country: while the majority of violent events and homicides in the second quarter of 2023 were recorded in the Port-au-Prince Number of violent events Number of fatalities metropolitan area, the data indicate that insecurity continues to unfold in the Artibonite département, with an intensification of violent events in May (at least 60 deaths recorded, compared with 4 during the same period in 2022), but also in the département of Nord, Grande’Anse and Nippes, where most fatal incidents are either clashes between the police and members of armed gangs, or lynchings involving crowds of local residents, described as vigilante violence. Fig. 6. Number of violent events and fatalities per month from April 2022 to June 2023 in Haiti * ACLED database can be used to spatially represent recorded violent events and follow trends over time, but does not claim to be exhaustive. Sources : FEWSNET/CNSA, analysées par WFP-VAM (2023) Fig. 7. Violent events recorded in Haiti between April 01, 2023 and June 30, 2023 Source : ACLED (2023) 3 WFP VAM Bulletin Quarter 2 2023 Haiti Food security analysis [A] : disparities within départements and socio-professional category Aggregating the survey data collected by the WFP between January and June 2023 enables to highlight disparities in food consumption and resilience levels by commune (Fig. 8, Fig. 9), and to better understand the profiles and characteristics of the most vulnerable households in Haiti (Fig. 10, Fig. 11). The maps can help to better target the most vulnerable areas within each département: they illustrate the percentages of households per commune having insufficient food consumption between January and June 2023 (Fig. 8) and having implemented livelihood-based coping strategies (crisis or emergency) during the same period (Fig. 9). The majority of the communes in the North, Grande'Anse and Nippes (which are three globally vulnerable départements) show very high values for these two indicators; Fig. 10. Indicateurs de sécurité alimentaire des ménages suivant leur type d’emploi en Haïti in particular, the communes of Bassin Bleu, Bombardopolis and Saint-Louisdu-Nord (North), Chambellan, Jérémie, Roseaux and Pestel (Grande'Anse), as well as L'Asile and Petite-Rivière -des-Nippes (Nippes) are particularly vulnerable according to this analysis. In addition, the communes of the Port-au-Prince metropolitan area and Grand-Goave in the West, and, more sporadically, those of Marigot and Belle Anse (South-East), Gros Morne and Saint-Michel de L'Attalaye (Artibonite), Cavaillon (South), Boucan Carré (Centre) and Plaisance (North) also present abnormally high values for the two indicators. Jan-jun 2023 Fig. 8. Prevalence (% of households) of insufficient food consumption by commune in Haiti between January and June 2023 * Please note that these numbers of people with insufficient food consumption are not comparable with IPC food insecure figures (refer to methodology section). Jan-jun 2023 The table above (Fig. 10) shows that, on a national scale, households with daily jobs are the most vulnerable: 70% of them have insufficient food consumption, compared with 47%-50% for those with public-sector or stable employment. They are also among those who use most coping strategies (crisis or emergency) and have the highest percentage of households having 0 to 1 meal a day (69%). Households whose income Food insufficiency Coping strategy (FCS poor or borderline) (crisis or emergency) depends on agriculture are also highly vulnerable. University Secondary Primary None % Fig. 11. Percentages of food-insufficient households and those using coping strategies (crisis or emergency) by level of education Furthermore, data aggregated by educational level (Fig. 11) indicate that the more educated households are, the less likely they are to have insufficient food consumption (prevalence of 74% for the uneducated category, versus 65% for those educated at primary level, 60% at secondary level and 41% at university level). In the most-educated category, the percentage of households using coping strategies is higher than the one of households with insufficient food consumption, while the opposite is true in the case of less-educated households. Fig. 9. Percentage of households adopting coping strategies (crisis or emergency) by commune in Haiti between January and June 2023 Source : WFP, Geopoll/HungerMapLIVE (January-June 2023) 4 WFP VAM Bulletin Quarter 2 2023 Haiti A particularly dry start to the main agricultural season and prolonged rainfall deficits [D] In addition to a significant delay in the onset of the rainy season, rainfall deficits accumulated throughout the spring season have severely affected the country, particularly the départements of Grande'Anse, West, Centre and South-East. To a lesser extent, other départements are also impacted. The maps below (Fig. 12) show rainfall anomalies (percentage of average) in April 2023 (left), May (center) and June (right). The April rainfall anomaly map shows the severity of rainfall deficits at the start of the season, more particularly in the Centre, West and South-East parts of the Haiti. In May, only a few communes in the northern part of the country had precipitation levels above average (not necessarily restorative after such a delayed start to the rains). Fig. 12. Rainfall anomalies (percentage of average) by commune in April, May and June 2023, Haiti As for the rest of the country, rainfall levels were within the normal range, except for the départements of Grande'Anse, West and Centre, which were below average. During the month of June (at the start of which a particularly intense rainfall episode caused severe flooding in seven of the country's ten departments), the map shows negative anomalies almost everywhere in the country, making the situation truly critical for the majority of communes where deficits have continued to accumulate so late in the rainy season. Moreover, such rainfall deficits are part of wider picture : Haiti has been affected by a long multi-year cycle of abnormally dry conditions since 2013. Such seasonal anomalies are expected to have severe repercussions on the current agricultural season, which accounts for around 50% of the country's annual production. In addition to these ongoing difficulties, there are major challenges ahead under the influence of an El Niño episode, which is confirmed to develop in the second half of 2023, according to forecast studies: this oceanographic phenomenon involves extreme weather events, including even drier conditions in Haiti's geographical area. Seasonal weather forecast [E] The rainfall situation is expected to improve over the coming months: according to forecast datasets for the period of July-August-September (corresponding to the end of the growing period and the harvesting period), average rainfall levels over Haiti are above average - but this may likely not compensate for the abnormally dry start of the season. Source : CHIRPS/UCSB, processed by WFP RAM-C 5 WFP VAM Bulletin Quarter 2 2023 Haiti Methodologies [A] WFP’s continuous, near real-time monitoring system (HungerMapLIVE) [B] Food price analysis (VAM Economic Explorer) [C] Monitoring insecurity and violent events with ACLED database This system collects thousands of survey data The WFP VAM Food and Commodity Price The Armed Conflict Location & Event Data points per day remotely, through live calls Database is collected and made available by Project (ACLED) database compiles and made from call centers around the world, the RAM Economic unit of the World Food analyzes disaggregated data for mapping including Haiti. The sample is 116 households Programme. It provides information on food crisis areas. It collects information on the per department, and 120 per commune in prices, covering food commodities such as dates, actors, locations, fatalities, and types the Port-au-Prince metropolitan area, maize, rice, beans, fish and sugar for 76 of violent events reported around the world. selected monthly by random telephone countries and some 1,500 markets. It is This data is granular, near real-time, and is dialing, to be interviewed. These analyses updated weekly, but largely contains monthly available to the public for free. enable to monitor some key food security data. indicators, such as insufficient food A market is considered a "hotspot" if the It is important to note that there are consumption or household coping strategies. price of at least one of the commodities with Monitoring their evolution over time could a caloric contribution of 5% or more of the thus constitute an alert mechanism for national total reached the ALPS (ALert for programmatic readjustments, as well as an Prices Spikes) crisis level in the last month of advocacy tool. The prevalence rates of the monitoring period. insufficient food consumption presented in this bulletin should not be compared to the proportion of food insecure people as provided by the IPC classification exercises which consider many more indicators than insufficient food consumption and coping Useful links : dataviz.vam.wfp.org/economic_explorer/prices dataviz.vam.wfp.org/economic_explorer/priceforecasts-alerts limitations to using the ACLED database: it does not claim to be comprehensive and to collect all violent incidents, especially for areas that are difficult to access or have little information coverage. However, while this data is not a primary source for day-to-day monitoring of security and safety operations, it does provide important information on trends and possible geographic expansions of insecurity in crisis areas. Useful link : acleddata.com/about-acled/ strategies. Useful link : hungermap.wfp.org/ 6 WFP VAM Bulletin Quarter 2 2023 Haiti Méthodologies [D] Climate analysis and seasonal monitoring [E] Seasonal forecast C3S(Copernicus Climate Change Service) For more information Climate and seasonal analyses are conducted The Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) RAM Unit| World Food Programme by WFP RAM Climate and Earth Observation is one of the few services to provide monthly team. These analyses are based on medium- global seasonal forecasts for the coming term records (since 1981) of precipitation, three months, proposing possible weather vegetation and temperature. scenarios (wetter, drier, warmer or colder wfp.haiti@wfp.org Rainfall anomalies are derived from the than average for that period of year) and @WFP_Haiti Climate Hazards Group InfraRed Precipitation providing probabilities for each scenario. with Station data (CHIRPS), produced by the C3S forecasts result from the combination of University of California. These data combine satellite imagery with in situ station data to create precipitation time series. The SPI (standardized precipitation index), based on precipitation data, is a widely used index to characterize drought at different time scales. On short time scales, the SPI is closely related to soil moisture, while on longer time scales, it informs about groundwater availability. The Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) is a common proxy used to monitor vegetation. NDVI data in use is from the eight individual seasonal forecasting systems; this process generally compensates for some of the systematic errors in each model. The resulting probabilities are stratified according to the median, lower, upper or middle third, and the lowest or highest 20% of the climate model distribution. The reference period for Karibe Hotel, Juvenat 7 Route du Canapé-Vert 1610 Petion Ville Smaila Gnegne Head of VAM/M&E smaila.gnegne@wfp.org Laure Boudinaud VAM geospatial analyst laure.boudinaud@wfp.org Jean-Carel Norceide VAM officer jeancarel.norceide@wfp.org calculating the mean values is 1993-2016, for all suppliers from which the data is drawn. Useful link : climate.copernicus.eu/seasonalforecasts MODIS Terra and Aqua satellites, which provide global coverage since 2000. Useful link : dataviz.vam.wfp.org/ seasonal_explorer/rainfall_vegetation/help 7