The role of International
Organizations in monitoring food
security
Pietro Gennari,
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
60th World Statistics Congress – ISI 015
STS037 - CCSA Session on International Statistics: STATISTICAL INDICATORS FOR
MONITORING AND ACHIEVING THE SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS
Background
• Global Monitoring of development outcomes by International
Organizations (IOs) mandated by member countries
• Traditional monitoring role of IOs:
• Contribute to define metrics/indicators
• Develop methods, standards and tools for data collection
• Provide technical support to countries for their implementation
• Disseminate global databases, ensuring international
comparability of indicators
• Produce annual report on progress
• When IOs cannot rely on official sources may use non-official
sources to ensure data harmonization and to fill data gaps (CCSA)
• IOs may launch direct data collections to produce indicators not yet
covered by official statistics (SQAF and proper governance needed)
FAO mandate on Agriculture & Food Security
• Article 1 FAO Constitution: The Organization shall collect, analyse,
interpret and disseminate information relating to nutrition, food and
agriculture
• Six editions of the World Food Survey from 1946 to 1996
• 1996 FAO World Food Summit set the global target to halve the
number of hungry people by 2015
• Indicator selected: Prevalence of Undernourishment (PoU)
• State of Food Insecurity in the World (SOFI) published yearly since 1999
• MDGs - Target 1.C: Halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of
people who suffer from hunger
• PoU one of the 2 official MDG Indicators to monitor 1.C
• Progress at global, regional and country level reported in SOFI and in
the Global MDG Report
From the MDGs to the SDGs
 SDGs - Goal 2: End hunger, achieve food security and improved
nutrition, and promote sustainable agriculture.
 5 multidimensional targets and 3 Means of Implementation
 On many SDG 2 targets there are no official statistics produced at
country level: new indicators needed
 Need of new indicators also to respond to new data requirements
 E.g. target 2.1: replacing the PoU as the focus is on food access,
not on hunger
 Some indicators produced outside of the national statistical system
 Need to bring back the ownership to countries (e.g. NSO to validate
the data)
Target 2.1: Limitations of the PoU
• Target is universal, not limited to developing countries
• PoU producing information only for developing countries
• Target is ambitious: Eradicating, not halving hunger
• 5% threshold for the PoU is too high
• Not only hunger, but food access for all
• Food availability is the main component of the PoU
• Need to disaggregate at sub-national level (vulnerable groups and
geographical areas)
• PoU available only at the national level
• Need for real-time assessment
• PoU based on 2-3 year old data
The “Voices of The Hungry” Project
• New indicator of food access for global and national monitoring
required by SDG Target 2.1
• Existing only in few countries. Global Monitoring cannot be
based on national sources in the short-term
• For the 1st time FAO to produce a global food access indicator
through direct data collection (Voices of the Hungry Project)
• Established the Food Insecurity Experience Scale (FIES), a metric
for the severity of food insecurity for households or individuals
• Since 2014 annual FIES estimates for about 150 countries,
through the Gallup World Poll
• Technical assistance provided to countries to introduce the FIES
in national household surveys and eventually take over
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The VoH project: main benefits
• It provides a direct measure of people’s ability to access food
• Enables assessment of the depth of food insecurity (mild, moderate,
or severe) => can be used in developed countries
• A sound methodology (Item-Response Theory) allows assessment of
reliability and precision of the measures
• A new metric for both households and individuals, thus proper
analysis of gender related food insecurity disparities
• The short questionnaire (9 yes/no questions) can be easily applied
in virtually any household or individual survey
• Rapid and low cost – enables timely global monitoring
• Governments can use the indicator for targeted intervention, and
monitoring/measuring impact of policies/programmes
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The VoH project: Quality Assurance
• Recognized world experts as member of the Scientific Advisory
Committee and external scientific peer-review of methods
• Rigorous procurement rules adopted for the selection of the data
supplier; Quality assurance procedures for the validation of results
• Methodology and data collection vehicle field-tested in 4 African
countries in 2013 before application to a global scale
• Open data policy: all micro-data and methodology publicly available,
including open source software
• Available national data on similar experience-based scales are
calibrated against the global FIES (e.g., US, Canada, Brazil, Mexico,
Guatemala) and replace the GWP data
• A parallel system of annual data collection at global level & periodic
larger scale data collection at national level, using the same tool
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Conclusions
• IOs are mandated by member countries to monitor development
outcomes. IOs support global monitoring in many ways (e.g. by
providing internationally comparable Global Public Goods)
• IOs may use of non-official data only for very compelling reasons,
including to fill information gaps or meet emerging needs
• Monitoring SDG2 requires the development of new indicators
• For the 1st time FAO relies on direct data collection to produce a global
indicator: FIES estimates available in about 150 countries for 2014 and
2015 (SDG baseline)
• Rigorous quality assurance procedures and country consultation applied
• Ensure data harmonization & comparability across countries and regions
• Methods, Software, linguistic and cultural adaptation of the
questionnaire, technical assistance provided to countries for eventual
national handover and sustainability
• Long-term vision: FIES included in national HH survey in every country
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