FUNIDES Claims Weaknesses in Zero Hunger Program Jul 14, 2007 – Nicaragua Network Hotline
The Nicaraguan Foundation for Social and Economic
Development (FUNIDES) criticized the "Zero Hunger Program," with which the
government will try to remove 75,000 families from poverty during the next
five years.
Javier Argόello, executive director of FUNIDES, said that
the program shows some weaknesses because it lacks a clear definition of
objectives. The Zero Hunger Program proposes to make peasant families food
self-sufficient by giving them plants and animals valued at US$2,000.
Each family will pay back 20 percent of the value. The
premise is that each peasant family is able to produce its own milk, meat,
eggs, fruits, vegetables, and cereals, and in the medium-term, to establish
local markets to sell the excess. Each nuclear family will receive a pregnant
cow, a pregnant pig, six chickens, seeds, fruit and medicinal plants,
revolving credit, a biodigestor, and other agricultural inputs.
Biodigestors convert manure into methane cooking gas thus
relieving the need to cook with wood. The program is based on the successful
program developed by the Nicaraguan NGO CIPRES which has made more than 5,000
peasant families food self-sufficient in recent years.
Argόello said that 48% of the Nicaraguan population lives in poverty and
14.9% percent lives in extreme poverty. Based on such numbers, he estimates
that the Zero Hunger Program will not cover all of the people who live in
conditions of extreme poverty on a dollar or less a day. Official statistics
indicate that the Nicaraguan population is reaching the 5.1 million
people.
With obvious funding constraints it seems self-evident that
the Zero Hunger Program alone can't meet all the needs of a rural population
ignored since 1990 by successive neoliberal governments and denied credit by
IMF structural adjustment conditions on international assistance. The removal
of 75,000 families from the ravages of hunger seems to us to be something to
celebrate not to criticize because there isn't enough money to bring everyone
up from poverty.
Argόello also insisted that the success of this type of program is tied to
"external monitoring" by international institutions. Silvana Flinn,
investigator of FUNIDES, said that families selected to benefit under the
Zero Hunger Program must be chosen by technical and nonpolitical criteria.
"It is important that we to know the beneficiary selection process and that
the program is not politicized, to assure its effectiveness," he added.
FUNIDES also criticized the government's treatment of the program budget. "It
is necessary to present the budget, which permits us to make an analysis of
the structure of costs.". Argόello added that the budgetary structure of the
program is not known. He indicated that the released budget shows that over
25% will go to administrative expenses, which he considers a little high, and
hopes that lowering it will improve the logistic capacity.
He also said that the beneficiary families need training in order to know how
to administer the productive assets that they will receive and so that they
can do more with them and not consume them immediately due to their own
necessities. Also, due the families' present conditions, there is a danger
that a permanent dependency on the State is created. The CIPRES program
involved intensive training and follow-up with recipients. It is not clear
whether the Zero Hunger Program includes the same level of training.
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