Food Security Sector (Palestine) 2015 3rd Quarter Highlights - FSS report/Non-UN document

In brief

SEFSec survey

PCBS and the FSAU have been working on the data reporting and analysis.

Reporting

The FSS has contracted a senior team from the University of Florence in order to receive highly qualified international support in the making of the SEFSec reports. The team carried out a mission to Palestine at the end of August. The FSAU discussed and reviewed the draft initial report. PCBS and the FSS will release a preliminary summary report at the beginning of December.

Data Analysis

The team working on the analysis required a few additional weeks for the verification and consolidation of the statistical procedures. This is mainly due to the introduction of the panel approach, which was introduced to increase the reliability of the analysis over time. Preliminary results and figures available are being used for contributing to the Humanitarian Needs Overview (HNO) 2016. The results show that in 2014, around 27% of the households in Palestine or 1.6 million people are considered severely or moderately food insecure as per the graph below.

Graph 1. Households Food Security in Palestine

The graph shows the preliminary results of the SEFSec 2014 survey. The summary report will be released in December.

HPF and SRP gap filler

The Humanitarian Pooled Funds (HPF) called for a standard allocation through a call for proposals that has been launched in the 2^nd quarter, under the leadership of the HC and linked to the priorities of the Strategic Response Plan (SRP). Two proposals were accepted, one in the West Bank and one in the Gaza Strip. One granted to a local NGO and the one to an international NGO with a strong partnership with a Palestinian NGO.

Gaza project implemented by local organization, the project is about an income generating project for 100 farmers from both sexes (50 males and 50 females) in two areas to fully rehabilitate 200 Donums of their agricultural land which had been targeted and destroyed as a result of the war in 2014, in addition to rehabilitation of two agricultural water wells with 1,000 meters of carrier lines. The West Bank project implemented by INGO in partnership with local partner aims at strengthening the resilience of farmers' households in the North of the Jordan Valley. The activities are designed as to encourage farmers to increase the farmed areas and to develop a proper use of the water sources available, as a strategy to increase their resilience against from further confiscations and restrictions.

PC 2016

OCHA led a kick off meeting for the HPC 2016 for outlining the humanitarian needs overview (HNO) and triggering the definition of the humanitarian response plan (HRP). Focus is on how/where humanitarians can add value vis-a-vis development and political

frameworks/action. In addition, defining the main needs, drivers, vulnerabilities that will HNO at country and clusters/sector levels. FSS team participated in the HPC kick off workshop conducted by the HCT at the end of July.

FSS conducted two introductory workshops (West Bank and Gaza) for local partners in coordination with PNGO; the objective is to provide local organizations with more information about the HPC process and to illustrate the HNO and HRP processes and requirements.

The FSS led a consultative and participatory process to discuss problems and needs related to the food security in Palestine. Two workshops were held in West Bank and Gaza Strip respectively in order to elaborate on the humanitarian needs. The FSS has finalized the consolidated its HNO documents and discussed it at the FSAU level. The HRP workshops are planned to be conducted during October. In order to have common approach and sharing the findings among partners, FSS partners contributed to elaborate a matrix of recent assessments.

FSS approached both AIDA and PNGO in order to reformulate the vetting panel for the HRP projects; the vetting panel includes line ministries, lead agencies and representative from PNGO and AIDA.

In-depth assessment Gaza MoA

The FSS team has continuous follow up to this issue with the MoA in Gaza by meeting the new senior staff in the ministry and offering any technical assistance needed. The final report draft is still under preparation.

Demolition response

The Demolition System is an inter-agency tool which tracks demolitions and confiscations of Palestinian property in the West Bank. Based on the demolition system, the FSS is engaged in following the response and advocating for possible additional allocation of resources to cover any gaps. For this quarter, no significant gaps were reported.

FS dashboard

The FS Dashboard aims at replacing the previous FS Watch tool by providing a more dynamic and continuously freely accessible source of data to the wider public. With the IT support by OCHA, The FSS launched the dashboard as an IM tool that provides updated important and essential FSS indicators and figures. The dashboard is now accessible at this link https://public.tableau.com/profile/ocha.opt#!/vizhom e/FoodSecuritySector/FoodSector

and the FSS team is working toward improving the tools also thanks to the feedback and comments raised by partners:

Coors !nation among line ministries and FSS partners

FSS continued to coordinate among line ministries (MoA, MoSA, MoL,) and FSS partners for cleaning and validating lists of potential beneficiaries of their implemented activities. Areas of work included agriculture and cash program interventions, especially in the Gaza Strip.

Committee

The FSS Steering Committee met at the beginning of 03-2015 mainly to discuss the ToR for the FSS in 201617. The ToR were revised and commented. No major changes were made to the current ToR, confirming the validity of the present structure and main objectives. The next Steering Committee meeting will take place before the end of the year and will finalise the plan for 2016-2017.

Information Management (IM): 3-4Ws and more

FSS partners updated of the 4Ws matrix. The last version is available from the FSS web site. The FSAU met also to discuss and endorse the contribution to the Vulnerability Profile Project (VPP+) lead by OCHA. This is a community-centered survey covering both

the West Bank and Gaza Strip with inter-cluster contributions.

FSS also contributed to the IDP mapping exercise launched by the IDP technical working group in Gaza Strip. This exercise intends to survey all IDPs household generated by the summer 2014 war and identify their status, socio-economic conditions and their livelihoods after the war.

In cooperation with MoA, FSS developed and produced a damages-response matrix in regard to the last war in Gaza addressing the needs originated during the conflict and the response that have been achieved by different actors. However, this matrix will be updated and completed based on the final report of damages that will be issued by MoA.

The table in the next page shows the war 2014-related damages and the level of response in the agricultural sector as of mid of Q3-2015.

FSS meetings in this quarter:

• 1 Steering Committee meeting

• 1 FSS meeting for both West bank and Gaza.

• 2 FSS workshops on HNO (Gaza & West Bank)

• 4 FSAU meeting: for discussing the HNO findings, the VPP+ and the SEFSec short report.

• 1 Core group meeting for the discussion of SEFSec findings.

Contacts

Lead agencies FAO and WFP

Ciro Fiorillo – ciro.fiorillo@fao.org; Daniela Owen – daniela.owen@wfp.org

Sector focal points

Marco Ferloni – marco.ferloni@foodsecuritycluster.net +972 (0) 546773171