ReliefWeb

1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The humanitarian situation in Zimbabwe continues to be stable, but elements of fragility remain cause for concern in key sectors such as food security, health and nutrition, and water, sanitation and hygiene. A crop and livestock assessment report estimates that food production has slightly increased compared to the 2009/2010 season, with increases due to increased acreage planted and timely agricultural inputs and extension support provided by all humanitarian stakeholders. However, food security remains a pressing issue with achievements at risk from a protracted dry spell which affected six out of ten provinces this year.
Rates for chronic and acute childhood malnutrition still stand at 35% and 2.4% respectively. One-third of rural Zimbabweans still drink from unprotected water sources, and while the scale of cholera has significantly reduced compared to past years, localised outbreaks continue due to the poor state of the health and water, sanitation and hygiene sectors.

Politically, the country remains stable; however, decisions regarding agreement on a new roadmap toward elections will influence the future course of the political situation. The country’s economy continues to make progress with the continued use of multiple currencies, but challenges remain in attracting largescale investment to push the country out of generalised humanitarian need to recovery and development. The Consolidated Appeal (CAP) therefore continues to lay a strong emphasis on recovery, taking into account priority areas outlined in the Joint Recovery Opportunity Framework and recommendations from other government policy documents in place.

Key priorities for the remainder of 2011 will be improving food security levels; addressing the needs of asylum seekers, migrants and other vulnerable groups that need protection; prevention of and rapid response to disease outbreaks; and response to natural disasters. All these activities will be undertaken while ensuring that humanitarian and government priorities remain complementary in all areas of intervention.

The achievements of the new “programme based approach” adopted this year were reviewed, and found to be generally positive, particularly the approach’s flexibility and improved coordination environment. The approach’s alignment with government priorities has enabled humanitarian partners to respond adequately to the changing needs of the country, and enabled programmes that would ensure a strong foundation for recovery to be implemented while at the same time addressing the immediate and emerging humanitarian needs. It has also proved a very useful tool for not only strategic planning but also enabled easy monitoring of outcomes against set programmed objectives and activities. Although a mission from the Good Humanitarian Donorship gave a positive assessment of the approach, challenges remain in securing the additional capacity required to support the cluster coordinators in managing the process, and how to report funding to programmes and activities in the absence of agency-specific projects.

Following analysis of the most recent needs assessments, the Mid-Year Review identified minor increases in requirements for most clusters. The main increase is accounted for by an increase in requirements for the Agriculture Cluster due primarily to availability of better data. Requirements for the Food and Water,
Sanitation and Hygiene Clusters were also increased due to projected increases in areas of coverage and more identified needs respectively. Revised requirements amount to US$488,582,358, an increase of $73,306,618 (18%) over original requirements.1 Partners have indicated that $141,824,362 in funding has been received, leaving unmet requirements of $346,757,996 and the CAP 29% funded.