NIGER PROGRAMME PLAN 2016
1. Introduction
While the political stability remains fragile, Niger’s economy has been performing well, and is expected to reach 6.5% in 2016 – up by .5% from 2015. The governnment’s three year growth and development strategy (Programme de Développement Économique et Social) aimed at maintaining macroeconomic stability while improving the country's public financial management systems has guided
Niger's economic policy since 2012, leading to this growth. The implementation of the President’s 3N
initative (Nigeriens Nourish Nigeriens) continues to strengthen agricultural output and places resilience
to climate change at the center of the government’s priorities. Despite the heightened social and political tensions, it is expected that the ruling coalition, led by President Mahamadou Issoufou, will remain
in power until the February 2016 national elections.
Although relatively stable throughout 2015, the lead up to the February 2016 Presidential elections is
likely to have an adverse effect on the economy (i.e. slow down policymaking and implementation, as
well as proper budget allocations), on society and could also impact negatively on Concern programming. The major threat to the political stability is more on the regional front with the on-going instability in Mali, Nigeria and Libya, and is likely to continue affecting the humanitarian situation in Niger substantially, with the displacement of refugees, IDPs and returnees (displaced from Nigeria:
105,583; displaced from Mali: 50,983).
Even though Niger’s social indicators have improved significantly over the past decades, Niger remains one of the poorest countries in the world, with a poverty rate at 46%, a population growth rate
of 3.9% - one of the fastest population growth rates in the world, and a per capita income of $302.35
(2014). While progress toward the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) is a main priority of the
government, most of them still remain out of reach.
Country Strategic Plan
Time line:
2014 - 2016
In 2016, Concern in Niger will continue to focus its work on enabling extremely poor households in
becoming more resilent to the changing environment, in claiming their rights and building their futures in addressing hunger, and access to primary education, maternal and child health services. This
will be achieved through the on going implementation of the strategic plan. As the Integrated Resilience Programme will be coming to an end in 2016, preparations will be initiated from March onwards
in designing a continuation of this multi-annual programme. The new phase will be designed based
on recommendations from the 2015 internal evaluation, and review in 2016 of the contextual analysis.
Concern will continue to provide support during the June – Septembet hunger gap season, while seeking innovative solutions to increase the impact and effectiveness of its programmes, and on improving
programme quality by measuring results. In addition, we will be further strengthening our collaboration with local and international civil society, government as well as the donors for mobilising support
to people in extreme poverty. Management syestems and processes will be further strengthened to
effectively deliver the strategic plan and programmatic priorites.
1.
Programmes
Emergency/Mitigation
Beneficiaries:
Emergency: estimated 4,000 households (cash); 1,500 cases of SAM with medical complications, 7,000
cases of SAM without medical complications and 20,000 cases of MAM in pregnant and lactating
women and children under five years of age. Mitigation: 3,500 households
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In 2016 Concern will continue to support the Ministry of Health to prevent and respond to malnutrition amongst children and pregnant and lactating women through CMAM activities, particularly during periods of peak admissions. Concern works with the government to ensure the integration of
these services within the health system and to strengthen their capacity. This support consists largely
of ensuring that health services have sufficient medicines, trained personnel, therapeutic foods and
equipment to treat malnutrition, while supporting community level volunteers to ensure that malnourished children and pregnant/lactating women are screened and referred to treatment programmes, defaulters and absents are followed-up and important health and nutrition education is
provided. Through the Surge Capacity model, Concern will continue to work with health centres to
ensure timely responses to increases in caseloads through their on-going support and monitoring.
Concern will continue to be an active and influential member of the Nutrition Alliance of ECHO
partners put in place in 2014 to improve the efficiency and efficacy of NGO support to the integration
of quality treatment of acute malnutrition into health services in Niger through the sharing of lessons
learned, harmonized and standardized approachs, and increased advocacy.
Concern’s emergency programme will also provide assistance to the most vulnerable households in
four communes in Tahoua to improve food security and reduce malnutrition. The timing of the assistance will depend on the results of the research which is currently underway with the University College London (UCL). The research is focused on the relative impact of shorter and longer-term cash
transfers on malnutrition. Concern will continue to play an active role in the Food Security ECHO Alliance and its advocacy sub-group to align approaches and move towards linking non-governmental
emergency assistance with the government’s longer-term social protection programme.
At the same time, Concern’s livelihoods mitigation programme will build on the progress made during 2015 in rebuilding household assets, continuing support to households and community groups to
diversify their livelihoods, adopt climate-smart agriculture techniques, sustain natural resources and
improve their overall food security. Concern is looking at introducing some innovative approaches
like introducing seed vouchers and fairs instead of carrying out regular distributions which is also
more empowering for farmers.
Integrated Resilience Programme
Beneficiaries:
Integrated/Multisectoral: 3,000 households;
Education: 11,674 children (6,743 boys and 4,931 girls);
Health/Nutrition/WASH: 112 villages (approx. 24,000 households) 10 health centers, and 24 health
posts)
In 2016 Concern will concentrate its efforts on strengthening the activiites carried out between 2012
and 2015 in our targeted 112 villages and their associated health structures in Bambeye and Tebaram.
Education
Concern’s education programme will continue to work with the Ministry of Education, schools, parents and community members to improve the quality of education and literacy standards in targeted
schools through curriculum and resource development and teacher training. An appropriate learning
environment and improved child protection will continue to be promoted through the elaboration of a
code of conduct in the schools and sensitization at community level. In late 2015 Concern introduced
the use of video technology as an innovative way to improve and monitor teaching practices in the
classroom and share lessons learnt between schools. Teachers are filmed during lessons and then the
material is used during teacher training to illustrate positive and negative teaching practices and
classroom behaviour as well as to demonstrate child-centred activities and child appropriate feedback
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and evaluation mechanisms. Working with the Ministry for Primary Education in Niger and educational trainers, Concern will continue to support this initative and promote its use more widely.
Food Security and Livelihoods
During this last phase of IRP, Concern will continue to provide a range of interventions across the agriculture, livestock and livelihoods sectors, to support women and vulnerable households to diversify
their livelihoods and increase their income through a mixture of agriculture and livestock interventions (climate-smart agriculture training, seed and livestock distribution, training of livestock assistants) as well as providing training and asset transfers to support income generation activities. In
addition, natural resource management training and agroforestry activities will be enhanced to help
communities to regenerate natural lands and protect soils. DRR activities, such as the setting up and
continued support to early warning systems, will also aim to contribute to household and community
resilience in the face of a changing environment.
Health/Nutrition/WASH
Concern will provide support, in the form of training, equipment, medicine and personnel, to the
government health system at district, community level so as to reduce mortality, morbidity, and
malnutrition rates and improve the quality of services. Concern will continue the behavior change
communication activities of community volunteers, while increasing the number of community health
volunteers able to treat basic childhood illnesses at community level and further expanding the volunteer’s network to cover additional communities, as it maintains an important (missing) link between
communities, health structures and districts. Concern will continue its focus on gender, with continuing support of its Ecoles de Maris (husband schools) activities which aim to increase men’s understanding of and contribution to the health and nutritional status of their families, and other reproductive health activities.
WASH activities will retain a community focus – in addition to the rehabilitation of wells, Concern
will train and support hygiene committees in targeted villages and will expand its Community Led
Total Sanitation activities to encourage communities to improve sanitation through the construction
and use of family latrines.
2. Monitoring and Evaluation
Programme/
Timeframe
Donors
project
Integrated
Resilience
Mitigation
Emergency/
Mitigation
2012-2016
All- Updated
contextual
analysis
2016-2020
2015-2016
2015
Irish Aid, UNICEF,
JOAC
OFDA
ECHO/OFDA,
HPP, WFP,
UNICEF
Irish Aid
Insert timelines for any events planned in 2016
Contextual
Baseline or
MT
Final
analysis
endline study
review evaluation
Endline Nov
Done in
2016
2015
n/a
May 2016
n/a
May/June 2016
(baseline); Oct
2016 (endline)
Q2 (for phase
2)
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