This Good Practice Review explores programming practices in emergency food
security. It is not intended to be a guide or a ‘how-to’ manual. It is fairly brief,
offering an overview and suggestions for where to dig deeper: it is not
intended as a reference encyclopaedia. The objective of this review is to
provide a concise overview of conceptual issues and analytical and planning
approaches, together with state-of-the-art programming practices in
interventions designed to protect the food security of disaster- or crisisaffected
groups.Along with a brief description of the intervention, itsapplication, management and monitoring, each chapter includes references to the best topic-specific overviews, tools and case studies currently available.
This review is intended primarily for humanitarian aid workers, managers and
staff, as well as government officials and donor agency personnel, whose task it
is to ensure that food security is protected in times of emergencies. It is
intended to provide aid workers with a full range of programmatic options and
the means to determine which are best suited to their circumstances. But the
review is also of wider relevance. First, it provides an introduction for students
and others not familiar with the topic. Second, ‘emergency food security’ is a
category of programming intervention that requires broad linkages – to both
pre- and post-crisis programming interventions, as well as to other cross-cutting
strategies – if these programmes are to have any relevance beyond the saving
of human life in times of crisis. Saving lives, of course, remains the top priority
in acute emergencies – hence ‘emergency food security’ is a legitimate topic on
its own. But as most field workers intuitively know, in many contexts such
programmes have little impact unless linked to broader interventions and policy
changes. While much has been written on food security more broadly, this
review situates the emergency programming element in the context of the wider
debate on protecting people’s right to adequate food.
