Nutrition

Indicator Definition: The indicator refers to the total number of hectares where, with support from the EU, farmers have adopted sustainable land management practices aimed at reverting soil erosion, enhancing fertility, increasing biodiversity, improving water management or reducing chemical inputs

Sustainable land management practices encompass a vast array of agricultural techniques. Although non exhaustive, the main practices to be considered are:

• Rational use of mineral fertilisers
• Integrated pest management
• Improved soil organic matter
• Grassland development, improvement and rehabilitation
• Management of crop rotation
• Cultivation of green cover crops
• Rainwater harvesting
• Irrigation
• Agroforestry (land-use systems and practices where woody perennials are deliberately integrated with crops and/or animals on the same land management unit).
• Conservation agriculture (combination of minimum mechanical soil disturbance, managing the top soil to create a permanent organic soil cover, and crop rotation with more than two crop species). (EURF Level 2 Indicator 6)

Expert analysis

Assessment of knowledge should be done before and after training via tests or surveys.

*please delete as appropriate according to the local context

For more information about the GERF methodological notes please see https://europa.eu/capacity4dev/eu-rfi 

For more information about the EU RF methodological notes, please see https://europa.eu/capacity4dev/eu-rfi.

This includes survivors of conflict-related Sexual and Gender-based Violence (SGBV) and war crimes supported to access justice (e.g. legal aid, representation, protection measures, etc.) at national/ regional/ international level, also through the Rome Statute and International Criminal Court (ICC).

EU funded initiatives supporting smallholders’ capacities to engage in inclusive and sustainable agricultural growth by (i) developing their technical, organisational and management skills and practices to implement sustainable production techniques/methods; (ii) strengthening their organisations and their relationships with the private sector, researchers and governments; (iii) increasing their competitiveness, facilitating access to markets and exports and creating/enhancing links with other actors along the value chain; (iv) securing land tenure through a variety of approaches.

The support can include different activities such as making knowledge available, strengthening capacities, empowerment, support to involvement in innovation platforms, promoting (technical, social, and organisational) innovations and increased competitiveness, good governance and security of land tenure and land use rights. It can be delivered through training, advisory services, extension services and support in the following areas:

• Advocacy capacity: strengthening smallholders' organisations capacities to actively participate in and influence policy dialogue relating to agricultural policies, rural transformation processes, and territorial dynamics.
• Technical: sustainable management of natural resources, agro-ecology, use of seeds and other inputs, post-harvest handling, pest and disease control, livestock development, sanitary and phytosanitary measures.
• Entrepreneurship and Business Development: processing of primary goods, food safety, marketing, contract negotiations, accounting and other non-financial services setting-up/strengthening of farmers organizations.
• Market access: access to markets through support to food certification systems, market information systems, warehouse receipt systems, farmers markets.
• Secure land tenure: formal titling, certification or registration, as well as securing customary tenure through appropriate legal frameworks that ensure that customary rights cannot be negated and that farmers cannot be arbitrarily dispossessed of their land.

For more information about the EU RF methodological notes please see https://europa.eu/capacity4dev/eu-rfi. This can include, for example, training on New Agricultural practices, such as conservation agriculture, dry land farming initiatives, practices such as seed multiplication, applying integrated pest management (IPM), eliminating or reducing tillage.

Social transfers are defined as “non-contributory, publicly funded, direct, regular and predictable resource transfers (in cash or in kind) to poor or vulnerable individuals or households, aimed at reducing their deficits in food consumption, protecting them from shocks (including economic and climatic), and, in some cases, strengthening their productive capacity.” "Food security exists when all people, at all times, have physical, social and economic access to sufficient safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life."  Food insecurity exists whenever the availability of nutritionally adequate and safe foods or the ability to acquire acceptable foods in socially acceptable ways is limited or uncertain.

Method of Computation: Where only household data is available, the number of individuals will be computed by using the average composition of the household. Such data should be preferably retrieved from – in order of preference – project surveys, surveys realised in the same area of the project, department/regional statistics, and ultimately national statistics.

Transfer made to the same person (or household) over different periods (once a year, quarterly, monthly or seasonal) will be counted as one. If the quantity of beneficiaries of a specific project/programme varies over the year, the month with highest number of beneficiary will be considered as the number of beneficiaries of the project/programme for that year.

It will also be important to avoid double counting of the beneficiaries between years. Where EU Delegations can reliably estimate the number of individuals benefitting in year 1, then in year 2 they should aim to identify new individuals benefiting (i.e. not supported in year 1) and add this to the total from year 1. Thus, the number benefiting across years is simply additive, not cumulative

For the purpose of this indicator, individuals are included if they benefit directly from EU-funded interventions that target areas and regions affected by chronic and/or acute malnutrition and food insecurity. Areas and regions are considered as food insecure if they are classified as phase 2 and/or above on the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC). Food security exists when all people, at all times, have physical, social and economic access to sufficient safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life.
The internationally recognized pillars of food security include availability, access, nutrition, and prevention. Examples of EU assistance in regions by pillar include the following:

•  Availability of food - support to improve subsistence farming practices, e.g. provision of drought resistance seeds; support that aims to increase the production and productivity of smallholders, e.g. changes to the production of crops that are in demand at markets
• Improving access to food - provision of social transfers (in cash or in-kind, cash or assets) to poor or vulnerable individuals aimed at reducing their deficits in food consumption; support to farmers to introduce cash crops as a supplements rather than substitutes for food crops; support to off-farm employment (to reduce dependency on agriculture) through for example, identification of opportunities, introducing or improving post-harvest processes; support to improve small infrastructure (e.g. bridges); improving market information accessible to farmers (including ICT innovations); strengthening integration of smallholders into food supply chains; support farmers on rehabilitation of productive infrastructures e.g. irrigation.
  In a fortified food intervention, if the food is distributed to beneficiaries, the counting will be done as above. In contrast, if the intervention supports food processing and such food is later on distributed, the recipients should be considered as indirect beneficiaries and thus not be counted.
• Improving nutritional adequacy of food intake - interventions that promote and provide advice, training and support to adopt/utilise: kitchen gardens especially legumes (rich in energy, protein and iron); homestead production of animals (poultry, rabbits, goats, sheep and cattle); fish farming; dairy production; intercropping (complementary cereal-legume production) or bio-fortified crops (micro-nutrient or protein-rich foods)3; indigenous foods (forest products, wild fruits, insects, herbs).
• Mass publicity campaigns e.g. only distributing information leaflets are excluded.
• Enhancing crisis prevention and management: direct beneficiaries of household or community level disaster risk reduction management (e.g. early warning systems) and food reserves.
  Only individuals supported by the EU in areas or regions of food insecurity (e.g. IPC phase 2 and above) may be included for this indicator. Please note, related EU RF indicators on nutrition (EU RF 2.2) and smallholder (EU RF 2.3) are required to report the number of beneficiaries targeted in regions with IPC phase 2 and above.
  Individuals receiving vocational training, or provided access to credit through EU support should be counted under the VET/skills development indicator (EU RF 2.15) or the access to financial services indicator (EU RF 2.13) respectively.

For more information about the EU RF methodological notes please see https://europa.eu/capacity4dev/eu-rfi