The World Bank reveals a "major defect" in the distribution of aid in Yemen

English - Monday 17 May 2021 الساعة 11:50 pm
Aden, NewsYemen:

A World Bank study revealed that the coverage rate of all humanitarian programs combined is sufficient to cover the entire Yemeni people, based on data from the International Organization for Migration on the movements of displaced persons in 2020.

The study showed that the total number of families receiving all aid, a percentage of the population of the governorates, exceeds one hundred percent, restoring the reasons why many families remain without assistance to duplication, and that some families receive aid from more than one program due to the lack of coordination.

The study entitled “Social Protection and Jobs” revealed that the total number of beneficiaries of humanitarian and development programs combined, with no account of the interactions between programs, “increases enough to cover the entire population of Yemen,” with a large spatial variation.

The study said that this exclusion could be reduced significantly by improving coordination among agencies and programs, including by aligning the values of joint transfers according to the requirements of geographic targeting and target families.

The study suggested that “a large proportion of families - although not currently measured - receive benefits from more than one program, and that there are many families who may not receive any aid at all,” saying that “the size of duplication in programs cannot be estimated without a representative survey. Detailed household or integrated beneficiary databases ».

The study authors stated that “some of the forms of duplication referred to may be less important than others, especially when families receive subsidies from supplementary programs, or when the average transfer values of these programs are lower than others.” And they said that in the case of families that benefit simultaneously From similar programs providing subsidies of relatively high values, duplication may represent a drain on resources that can be directed to families who do not receive any assistance.

They concluded that "improving coordination among humanitarian and development agencies can provide ample room to reduce the number of families deprived of assistance."

According to the study, the percentage of families receiving aid is concentrated in Marib, Hajjah and Lahj, and their percentage is much higher compared to the population (more than 150 percent). However, without taking into account the duplication in receiving aid between families, in some cases "the high influx of internally displaced persons is not accurately reflected in the population's estimates."

On the other hand, the percentage of concentration decreases in the capital, Sana'a, Hadramout, Dhamar, Raymah and Ibb, as it appears that the total number of families benefiting from the programs combined "constitutes about 80 percent of the total number of families in these governorates or less."

Compared to the (weighted) average coverage at the national level, which is 103 percent, the percentage of beneficiaries in these governorates appears to be very low. Moreover, there does not appear to be a noticeable difference in the trends of concentration between the governorates of the north or the south, according to what was stated in the study.

The study stated that the differences between governorates in the ratio of included beneficiaries to the population are due to a group of families benefiting from more than one program at one time, in addition to the possibility of excluding many families from many programs. Of poor families in need, despite the wide coverage of the combined programs.

According to the study, between 20 and 30 percent of the participants in the monthly telephone surveys, through the World Food Program's vulnerability analysis system, "reported that they did not receive any aid at all in 2020."

Additional analysis conducted by World Bank experts indicates that "36 percent of those who were not covered by the aid showed their food consumption that they are food insecure, and that a large percentage of the rest of the excluded are about to reach this stage."

At the same time, the study says that the evidence that some families benefit from multiple programs together indicates that there are overlaps between the programs. In cases where the different programs that benefit the family complement each other, whether by providing different types of aid or ensuring the adequacy of the benefits by combining low-value transfers, these interventions can be considered beneficial. But in other cases where families benefit from more than one similar program or the value of transfers from each of these programs is high, the interventions represent a drain on resources that can be directed to benefit the currently deprived families.

According to the authors of the study, the shortcomings in the interventions need to be addressed to reduce exclusion and maximize the positive impact of aid. As the conflict enters its seventh year, Yemen faces an economic collapse and an unprecedented humanitarian crisis. While 10 million people face the risk of starvation, which is an alarming number.

 The conflict has led, according to the study, to impeding efforts to restore human development in what is already described as the poorest country in the Middle East and North Africa, and to endangering the lives and livelihoods of millions of Yemenis.

The study authors found that the programs implemented by humanitarian and development agencies share some common features, including increased reliance on cash assistance, some similarities in the use of aid delivery systems, and a focus on target groups, including the poor, food insecure and internally displaced people. .

While the study showed that only 2.4 percent of the population reported that they received emergency food aid in 2014 - the family budget survey - the World Food Program’s in-kind food aid program alone covered more than 1.39 million families in 2020; This represents 26 percent of the Yemeni population.