Commission's Communication on Humanitarian Food Assistance - Accompanying staff working paper - March 2010

On 31st March 2010, the Commission adopted a communication on humanitarian food assistance (HFA). This lays out a new policy framework for EU humanitarian action to strengthen efforts to tackle food insecurity in emergency and post-emergency contexts. The principal aims of this Communication are to: maximise the effectiveness and efficiency of EU food assistance and improve policy coherence, coordination, and complementarity between the Commission, Member States and other donors. The accompanying Staff Working Document explains, from a more operational perspective, how the Commission programmes, implements and coordinates its humanitarian food assistance. On May 10th 2010, based on the Communication, the Foreign Affairs Council of the European Union adopted Council Conclusions on Humanitarian Food Assistance. The communication on HFA was developed in close coordination with the communication on food security (adopted on the same day). This joint process enables differentiation between their policy focuses (either food assistance linked to humanitarian objectives  or food security linked to development objectives), while ensuring the coherence of both documents. This framework is also in line with the general principles of the European Consensus on Humanitarian Aid adopted in December 2007.

European Commission - March 2010