WFP Oxfam Gaza Cash Voucher Programme Review

Ben Mountfield rel ief – recovery – r isk reduction

[email protected] skype: benmountfield mobile: +49 151 45678 493 www.benmountfield.net

Cash Voucher

Programme Review of voucher assistance as a

safety-net transfer modality in the Gaza Strip

commissioned by

Oxfam GB and UN World Food Programme

Ben Mountfield

16 September 2012

Oxfam / WFP Cash Voucher Project in Gaza

Ben Mountfield of 54 16 September 2012

Executive Summary

The cash voucher programme is a high quality intervention that meets its objectives and the needs and expectations of the beneficiaries. From the perspective of the beneficiaries, it represents a significant improvement over in-‐kind distributions, particularly with respect to the quality of diet and aspects of choice and dignity. In terms of its broader objectives, the programme has had a significant and positive impact on the productive capacity of the dairy processing industry in Gaza, and there remains significant potential for further growth in this sector. There is also evidence of other knock-‐on and multiplier effects associated with the programme. A household’s score on the Proxy Means Test [Formula] (PMTF) is used as the main targeting criteria for WFP in-‐kind and voucher assistance. The application of the PMT formula has some shortcomings, which result in errors of inclusion and exclusion: this report considers the cause of these errors and presents some recommendations to reduce or mitigate them as far as possible. There should be a single PMTF for the whole of Gaza, used by all the actors in a common manner: it should be distinct from that used in the West Bank but follow the same logic and methodology; their results should be comparable. Enumerators from all organisations should be better trained to ensure that questions are asked and results gained in a manner that is consistent, objective and fair.

It would be helpful for the project implementation team to develop a detailed profile of the target groups for the various packages, disaggregated by household size, based on existing data and supported by targeted field research. This would support in the identification of errors of allocation from a range of sources, and also add to the growing understanding of poverty, sharing and support systems in Gaza.

The programme monitoring is heavier than the parallel in-‐kind distributions, in terms of depth and proportion of caseload. The trend of change is in the right direction, but opportunities still exist to bring the two monitoring frameworks closer together and make results comparable.

The modalities of the voucher distribution are modelled on the in-‐kind distributions rather than having been designed from scratch: improvements are possible. For example, transfer values can be denominated according to actual household size rather than being clustered into groups, and the distributions can be run on a true weekly basis rather than four times a month; increasing predictability for beneficiaries and normalising working hours for field staff.

Assistance for the very poorest needs to reflect their greater consumption gap, and should seek as a minimum to meet their entire food consumption so as to free up household finances for other essentials. The value of the assistance for this group should therefore be increased so as to make a consistent impact on the consumption gap across the range of poverty, and the impact of this additional assistance should be monitored.

Since the very poorest households struggle to access wheat flour unless it is provided in-‐kind, an enhanced voucher package is proposed for this group, with guaranteed access to wheat flour. Various options are presented to achieve this: the basic choice is between an extension of the voucher package to include wheat flour, or a combined voucher and in-‐kind system.

In order to allow the economical purchase of wheat flour in bulk, the voucher management arrangements should be altered to allow the voucher to accumulate through one calendar month. To achieve this it would be helpful to allow each voucher to be exchanged in two locations: one standard shop and one wholesaler – but this depends on the final implementation model adopted.

The list of approved items for voucher redemption should be revisited and if possible expanded to meet the needs of the beneficiaries and further support the broader aims of the project. Tomato paste, fresh milk and olive oil are all commodities worth a second look at this time.

The existing arrangements within WFP for a 10% contingency against price inflation have been reviewed and found to be appropriate although the contingency has not been necessary during the current cycle. Triggers for review of the value of the voucher top-‐ups have been identified: a sustained 5% increase in CPI is seen as an appropriate level for review.



Contents

Executive Summary .................................................................................................................................. 2 Contents ................................................................................................................................................... 3

List of figures .......................................................................................................................................................... 4 List of tables ........................................................................................................................................................... 4 Acronyms and abbreviations used ......................................................................................................................... 5 Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................................................ 5

Methodology ............................................................................................................................................ 6 Introduction ............................................................................................................................................. 7

Socio-‐economic context ......................................................................................................................................... 7 Programmatic context ........................................................................................................................................... 7 Targeting beneficiaries and the monitoring framework ........................................................................................ 8 Two linked reviews ................................................................................................................................................ 8

Programme Quality .................................................................................................................................. 9 Oxfam and WFP complementarity ......................................................................................................................... 9 Growing awareness of nutrition ............................................................................................................................ 9 Social dimensions ................................................................................................................................................... 9 The development of a stronger food-‐processing sector ...................................................................................... 10

CVP Processes ........................................................................................................................................ 11 Monitoring processes .......................................................................................................................................... 11 Monitoring the shops ........................................................................................................................................... 11 Monitoring the voucher exchange ....................................................................................................................... 12 Monitoring the households ................................................................................................................................. 12

Safety net transfer modalities and transfer values ................................................................................ 14 Which transfer modality do people prefer? ........................................................................................................ 14 How big are the households? .............................................................................................................................. 15 Weekly top-‐ups .................................................................................................................................................... 17 The value of the cash voucher in 2013 ................................................................................................................ 17 New modalities for 2013 ...................................................................................................................................... 17 Profiling these groups .......................................................................................................................................... 19 What are people actually eating? ........................................................................................................................ 20 Consumption gap ................................................................................................................................................. 20 A combined approach .......................................................................................................................................... 25 An alternative to distributions: an enhanced voucher ........................................................................................ 27 Options for adding wheat flour to the voucher items ......................................................................................... 27 Summarising the three options for the combined approach ............................................................................... 29

Targeting and the PMTF ......................................................................................................................... 30 Introduction to the Proxy Means Test ................................................................................................................. 30 Reflections on the MoSA PMTF ........................................................................................................................... 31 PMTF – better guidance for enumerators ........................................................................................................... 32 PMTF thresholds: inclusion and exclusion ........................................................................................................... 33 A human over-‐ride or a second tool? .................................................................................................................. 34 PMTF as a criterion for targeting and transition .................................................................................................. 36

Cost effectiveness and efficiency of the vouchers ................................................................................. 37 Alpha values ......................................................................................................................................................... 37 Quantitative and qualitative multiplier effects .................................................................................................... 38 Trends in the consumption of Palestinian products ............................................................................................ 39 Job creation .......................................................................................................................................................... 39 What additional products should be on the CVP menu? ..................................................................................... 40

Managing the contingency ..................................................................................................................... 41 The 10% contingency ........................................................................................................................................... 41 Trends in exchange rates and CPI ........................................................................................................................ 41 Modelling the combined effects .......................................................................................................................... 42 Scenarios for contingency planning ..................................................................................................................... 43 Setting thresholds for review and for action ....................................................................................................... 43



What happens when in-‐kind prices change? ....................................................................................................... 44 Process map for decision making ........................................................................................................................ 44

Recommendations ................................................................................................................................. 46 Annex 1: Terms of Reference ................................................................................................................. 48 Annex 2: the questions used to generate the PMTF .............................................................................. 52 Annex 3: key informants to the review process ..................................................................................... 53 Annex 4: alternative HH size categories for in-‐kind distributions .......................................................... 54

List of figures

Figure 1: households, families and extended families ........................................................................... 13 Figure 2: a journey through modalities? ................................................................................................ 15 Figure 3: distribution of household size within the CVP project ............................................................ 16 Figure 4: WFP proposed modalities for 2013 ......................................................................................... 19 Figure 5: a wealth of poverty lines ......................................................................................................... 31 Figure 6: the balance of PMTF questions by category ............................................................................ 32 Figure 7: do you have a computer? ........................................................................................................ 33 Figure 8: when will PMTF provide misleading answers? ........................................................................ 33 Figure 9: trends in the proportion of Palestinian dairy products carried by CVP shops ......................... 39 Figure 10: exchange rates and CPI over 30 months ............................................................................... 41 Figure 11: scenarios for contingency planning ....................................................................................... 43

List of tables

Table 1: perspectives of beneficiaries: when is it appropriate to use which modality? ......................... 14 Table 2: calculating value of the cash voucher ....................................................................................... 17 Table 3: three proposed modalities for WFP assistance in 2013 ........................................................... 18 Table 4: PMTF and HH size for 154 non-‐refugee families below the DPL. Source SEFSec ...................... 19 Table 5: proportional piling in focus groups ........................................................................................... 22 Table 6: calculating the value of the voucher component of the combined package ............................ 24 Table 7: standard and enhanced assistance packages as % of consumption gap .................................. 24 Table 8: proposed standard and enhanced assistance packages ........................................................... 25 Table 9: comparison of wheat flour and bread prices ............................................................................ 25 Table 10: CVP purchases of staples, January – April 2012 ...................................................................... 26 Table 11: calculating the value of the voucher component of the combined package .......................... 26 Table 12: summarising the three options for the combined approach .................................................. 29 Table 13: pre-‐CVP, current and planned milk consumption ................................................................... 38 Table 14: jobs created in CVP shops ....................................................................................................... 40 Table 15: the cost of a 100 NIS voucher ................................................................................................. 42 Table 16: the buying power of a USD 27.25 worth of NIS voucher in a range of conditions ................. 42



Acronyms and abbreviations used

CFW Cash for Work CSI Coping Strategy Index CVP Cash Voucher Project (previous Urban Voucher Project) of WFP / Oxfam / Ma’an ECHO European Commission, Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection EMOP Emergency Operation GFD General Food Distribution HDDS Household Dietary Diversity Score HFIAS Household Food Insecurity Access Scale MoSA Ministry of Social Affairs, Gaza (also MoSA group: beneficiaries referred by MoSA) MTR Mid Term Review NIS Israeli New Shekel – currency common to Israel and oPt. (also ILS) oPt occupied Palestinian territory PECS Palestinian Expenditure and Consumption Survey PCBS Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics PMT (PMTF) Proxy Means Targeting (Formula) SEFSec Socio-‐Economic and Food Security Survey TOR Terms of Reference (for this review) UNRWA United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East WFP World Food Programme

Acknowledgements

This review would not have been possible without the constructive support of the programme teams in East Jerusalem and in Gaza, of WFP, Oxfam and the Ma’an Development Centre. They each bring their own philosophy and expertise to this jointly implemented programme, and the result is considerably greater than the sum of its parts. Such collaboration is not without its challenges and the review process has been no exception. Some aspects of the final product – this report – are the product of a process of dialogue and compromise. Some are not: the report strives to recognise different perspectives while – in line with the expectations of the TOR – maintaining an independent viewpoint. It is quite possible that this report still contains errors of accuracy or omission. It certainly includes content and commentary that has been challenged by the stakeholders and yet retained after careful consideration. The report’s contents should not be considered to reflect the opinions or position of the programme’s implementing agencies – they are the opinion and the responsibility of the author. It should be noted that prompt action was taken to address many of the findings and recommendations while the report was still in a draft form, and the collaboration continues to be dynamic and engaged as the programme moves forward and grows. A good programme is becoming an even better programme. Differences of perspective and priority have in no way eclipsed the shared commitment of the programme partners to make a positive and meaningful difference to the lives of the most food insecure residents of the Gaza Strip.



Methodology

A balance of quantitative and qualitative methods was used to gain a thorough understanding of the project, its impact, and the context in which it operates. Participatory tools were used to explore the condition and opinions of programme beneficiaries and non-‐beneficiaries, and a range of proposals, issues and ideas were presented to debriefing meetings at Oxfam in Gaza and WFP in Jerusalem to seek preliminary feedback.

Secondary data

A range of secondary data were reviewed, including:

• Project specific documents such as the WFP EMOP and the Operational Guidelines,

• Previous reviews and evaluations of this and associated projects,

• Work done on cost effectiveness and cost efficiency of voucher projects in the West Bank, and the income elasticity of food demand in oPt,

• Reports and raw data from PECS, SEFSec, and other PCBS data,

• PMTF data collection tools, weightings and thresholds, and a World Bank report considered the effectiveness of the targeting for the social assistance programme of the West Bank and Gaza, which uses the PMTF as a targeting tool.

• Broader reports on the current socio-‐political-‐economic situation in oPt.

Quantitative analysis of monitoring data

A range of project-‐specific monitoring data was reviewed in Excel and SPSS:

• Beneficiary lists and demographic data

• Post Distribution Monitoring of voucher programme, at household level

• Shop monitoring data

• Data on the commodities exchanged through the voucher programme

Qualitative analysis through participatory methods

The main approaches used were semi-‐structured interviews with key informants and stakeholders to the project, and with focus groups of project beneficiaries and field staff. Focus groups were primarily used to triangulate and validate hypotheses suggested by the data analysis, place findings in context, and explore weaknesses and gaps in the data. Focus groups of male and female beneficiaries were generally interviewed separately, and focus groups were organised to gain feedback from those who had recently transitioned into the programme from an in-‐kind modality and could therefore offer comparisons between the two approaches. In all focus groups, ranking and other exercises were undertaken to clarify findings and ensure consensus. Visits were undertaken to shops participating in the programme and others, as well as to two of the market areas within Gaza city. Three local producers of dairy products were interviewed. A list of key informants and focus groups arranged is included as Annex 3



Introduction

Socio-economic context

It is not necessary here to rehearse at length the complex context of the Gaza situation, nor its severe and growing effects on the poorest segments of society. The following summary is incomplete, but relevant to the analysis below. Three interconnected groups of factors inform the socio-‐economic context, and critically, all are underpinned by the blockade:

• Restrictions on movement: subsequent loss of human, financial and social capital; limited imports, no exports. At the moment this is most strongly felt in the fuel crisis; at other times it is expressed in liquidity shortages of shekels or dollars, or in other ways. The shortage of employment opportunities is a constant result of the closure.

• Large families and rapid population growth, reduced land and property holdings with each generation. Put bluntly, despite the current building boom, the next generation of poor urban Gaza residents has nowhere to live.

• Fixed or reducing natural asset base, with increasing environmental contamination – this is particularly obvious in the water sector, but also true in farming and fisheries. With land being shared out at each generation, household level productive units are getting smaller and will eventually become non-‐viable, pushing people off the land.

The combined impact of these three sets of factors is a reduction in resilience: an increase in vulnerability as the resource and asset base of many households and businesses is inexorably depleted. No convincing scenario mapping exists that might explain how this situation will develop if the blockade continues: at what point the growing demands will completely outstrip the dwindling supply, and what the resulting crisis will look like. The network that provides support to vulnerable households in Gaza is intricate, and humanitarian actors are only one part of it. The absence of tools to understand this support network – or indicators to measure its health – is a weakness implicit in the humanitarian system.

Programmatic context

Six decades of political instability, five years of economic and social blockade, and the destruction of private and public infrastructure during military confrontations have led to the decimation of much the Gaza Strip’s productive economy. Over 50% of the people in Gaza are currently unable to meet their daily food requirements without support, due to an economy dependent on external support, few employment opportunities, low incomes for those with employment, and subsequent limited economic access to food. WFP provides large-‐scale food assistance to the non-‐refugee population, and currently provides support through four main modalities:

• General food distribution (GFD) targeting around 200,000 beneficiaries through the Ministry of Social Affairs (MoSA) and international NGO CHF;

• School feeding as an emergency safety net for 80,000 schoolchildren in public basic schools;

• Electronic cash voucher transfers for 30,000 food-‐insecure people, mostly with poor dietary diversity, in partnership with Oxfam GB – the subject of this review – and

• Provision of food rations to 7,000 individuals in orphanages and special-‐care institutions in partnership with MoSA.

The voucher programme was subject to a mid-‐term review in early 2011, the findings of which were used to develop and improve the programme. The current evaluation builds on and develops these findings. Programme implementation is undertaken by a partnership of WFP, Oxfam and the Ma’an Development Centre.



Targeting beneficiaries and the monitoring framework

Two of WFP’s programming modalities concern this review: one directly and one indirectly. In addition to electronic voucher programme, this review must also consider the general in-‐kind food distributions, since the voucher modality aims to provide an equivalent level of support to a similar target group. Both interventions are targeted at non-‐refugee households below the Deep Poverty Line described on page 31, measured using the Proxy Means Test Formula of the Ministry of Social Affairs. For 2013, new beneficiaries receiving the e-‐vouchers will be identified on the basis of their having poor or borderline scores for dietary diversity, measured using WFPs standard Food Consumption Score tool. The combination of a poverty indicator and a dietary diversity indicator provides a strong and appropriate basis for targeting the voucher programme.

Two linked reviews

This review overlaps with a review by the same author recently conducted for Oxfam, which examined a complementary piece of work. The two reports share some analysis of the context and the tools and systems. Inevitably, there is some duplication of content between the two, where this is necessary for each report to be complete and independently comprehensible. The prior review is titled: Unconditional cash transfers in Gaza: an external review, and has been published by Oxfam on the CaLP website.1 It looks specifically at the condition of the poorest households in Gaza and considers the mechanisms of sharing within extended families, and it looks at what impact unconditional cash transfers have on such households. There is also some overlap between the beneficiary groups. Around 60% of the beneficiaries of the unconditional cash transfers are also receiving the CVP, and were chosen from the CVP beneficiaries on the grounds of their low dietary diversity scores, low household incomes, and a range of other indicators. In this way they present an interesting precursor of the combined modality discussed in this report. The TOR for this review include a short section on Social Dynamics. This was explored in some detail in the previous review, and the interviews and focus groups undertaken as part of the current process did not throw any additional light on these issues. For this reason, there is no section directly addressing these issues in this report: interested readers are referred to the previous document.

1 http://www.cashlearning.org/downloads/Unconditional%20cash%20transfers%20in%20Gaza.pdf



Programme Quality

The TOR do not ask for an opinion on the quality of the programme, focusing instead on specific aspects for improvement and development and looking forward to the inclusion of a new modality for 2013. Before attempting to meet these expectations, however, it is worth making a few observations on the quality and impact of the programme. The EMOP 200298 emphasises much more than the provision of food, intending to improve the quality of people’s diet, specifically its diversity, and to strengthen the food production sector in Gaza. Given the economic impact of the blockade and the entrenched nature of food aid in Gaza, these are quite challenging objectives. From the perspective of the beneficiaries, who were interviewed through six focus groups for this review and in household interviews previously, the programme is of high quality, and represents a significant improvement on in-‐kind distributions of food aid. They consistently reported that they appreciate the choice they have in selecting the foodstuffs most appropriate to their family, the quality of the produce available through the voucher, and above all they appreciate the normality and dignity of going discretely to a local supermarket or shop instead of queuing for a hand-‐out.

Oxfam and WFP complementarity

The complementarity between Oxfam and WFP – who are not, perhaps, natural partners in the normal scheme of things – adds value to the programme. There is a real synergy between them and their differences in approach and in expertise are used to advantage. The resulting programme is greater than the sum of its parts.

Growing awareness of nutrition

The programme has improved beneficiaries’ awareness of nutrition, and there are reports that this has translated into improved diets through different approaches to ingredients and cooking. For example, several beneficiaries reported using far less cooking oil as a result of the programme, and specifically because of the work of a linked activity with local partner Ard El Insan which looks at nutrition and gender empowerment. This activity was not specifically evaluated, but it appears to be highly complementary. Efforts will be needed to ensure that raised awareness translates into sustained behaviour change.

Social dimensions

The programme has positive impact on both men and women achieving an elusive double benefit: restoring to some degree the man’s role as provider, while allowing women the opportunity to increase their mobility and social engagement outside the family. As noted elsewhere, a reliable and sufficient source of food or income is a major factor in reducing stress in the home. Both male and female beneficiaries report that with reduced stress comes a reduced risk of domestic and gender based violence. Beneficiaries make frequent comments in support of the choice that the voucher programme offers, and the increased dignity associated with shopping as opposed to collecting rations. The impact of these aspects cannot be calculated but should not be under-‐estimated. Positive impacts extend to the children also, with different aspects highlighted by male and female focus groups. As one parent said: ‘The voucher makes a party of every supermarket day’.



The development of a stronger food-processing sector

This area is specifically looked at in the report but is worth mentioning here in addition. The food sector in Gaza is highly dominated by imports, mostly from Israel with some commodities also coming through the tunnel trade via Egypt. Local products have not had much success and have to overcome perceptions of being of lower quality. Local production is often dependent on imported inputs and is vulnerable to changes in levels of supply. In this context the programme’s success in the dairy sector, in terms of improvements both in quality and scale, is a real achievement. It would be good to see this approach extended to other sectors and products that have been traditionally produced in Gaza, as the potential is now proven. The level of success – which appears to be considerably more than that achieved in the West Bank – is a function of the very different political and economic climate, and there is some optimism that the ceiling for such development has not yet been reached.



CVP Processes

Monitoring processes

Regular monitoring includes the following:

• Electronic monitoring of the value and quantity of the sales, backed up with a paper record and a fortnightly reconciliation

• Visits to the shops to check on the physical space, quality of products, packaging and expiry dates, storage conditions, the functioning of the electronic terminal, the display of the list of commodities and ceiling prices, and the suggestions/complaints box.

• Post Distribution Monitoring through household visits to beneficiaries based on a random sample

The monitoring load of the programme is heavy, and this is in part appropriate: the programme was (of course) a pilot in the early days, but this seems to be also influenced by the nature of the transfer: it has been noted elsewhere that cash and vouchers tend to attract heavier monitoring loads than in-‐kind distributions, and the monitoring tends to extend further beyond the point of transfer to beneficiaries and probe more into the use of the resources. This is also true for this programme. As the programme is becoming more established, the monitoring load is becoming lighter:

• Household monitoring for the CVP has reduced from 5% to 2.5% and now 1% per month.

• Household monitoring for the in-‐kind distribution has increased from less than 0.5% to around 0.5% per month

The monitoring load should reflect the purpose of the monitoring, rather than being influenced by the modality. For example, the monitoring at household level includes a question on how the household uses the income saved through the voucher provision: the parallel monitoring of the GFD has no such question. The CVP monitoring also probes more deeply into food sharing, although the question (see below) does not generate useful data. The frequent changes of monitoring templates makes data analysis very difficult, although this is in part associated with the natural growth and development of a pilot project.

Monitoring the shops

The shop monitoring appears to be at a broadly appropriate depth, but some of the questions could be improved to ensure that the identified indicators are actually accessible. The MTR of the CVP identified the need to be able to estimate the shop turnover due to CVP as a proportion of the total shop turnover. This was recommended in the narrative of the report but was not one of the formal recommendations. The current monitoring in CVP shops estimates the numbers of CVP beneficiaries and the total number of customers, but this presents a very distorted picture as the CVP beneficiaries tend to spend their entire voucher in one go (average value 54 NIS) while the many regular customers appear to spend just a few NIS at a time. So while the CVP customers are a minority and are presented as such, they punch above their economic weight. In order to gain a better understanding of the multiplier effects of the CVP within the local economy this information should be collected. A range of shops should be consulted to determine the most effective ways of asking the question.

Recommendation 1 The regular shop monitoring should include the shopkeeper’s estimation of the CVP spend as a proportion of total shop turnover, and other more specific indicators should also be explored.



The shop monitoring already includes information on the estimated proportion of Palestinian dairy produce, which is reported in the section on multiplier effects below.

Monitoring the voucher exchange

The process of voucher redemption is controlled by the electronic terminal. After having their ID confirmed, beneficiaries swipe their card and the shopkeeper enters the products they have purchased, the value of the products and the quantities using a menu on the terminal. The data entry of the value tends to be accurate; that of the quantities can be less so. If the terminal is not working for any reason, the beneficiary cannot redeem the voucher at that time (although the shopkeeper can and probably does offer them credit until the terminal is functional again). The terminal produces a receipt for the beneficiary and one for the shopkeeper. A second level of monitoring involves a bi-‐weekly printed sheet for each shop, which includes the names of all the beneficiaries, the value of their voucher and a space to sign. It remains unclear – and untested – whether beneficiaries can split the value of their voucher between two visits. The current universal practice is for beneficiaries to spend the entire amount in a single transaction. The form has only a single space per household and may encourage the common idea that the voucher should be spent in one visit. Recommendations later in the report require that the beneficiaries be able to split the voucher value into several transactions. The full set of printed and signed forms and associated receipts are reconciled against the e-‐voucher receipts on a bi-‐weekly basis, in order to validate the payments to shopkeepers. While the paper system is valuable as a cross-‐check for validation, it no longer needs to be monitored at 100% basis prior to payment as the e-‐system has been shown to be effective. A proportion of the shops could be manually verified each month. Removing this process would potentially allow the overall system to be altered so that the beneficiaries could split their expenditure between two outlets. This will be shown to be of value in the section on modalities.

Recommendation 2 The CVP paper-‐based monitoring system at the shop level should be reduced from a secondary system of control to a system of validation, and payments to shops be made purely on the basis of the electronic system.

Monitoring at household level

The proportion of households selected for Post Distribution Monitoring for the CVP is reducing as is appropriate. Now that the impact of the programme is proven at the household level, the trend should continue until it is equal to the proportion monitored for the in-‐kind distributions. As part of the same process, the depth of the investigation should also be equal, but in this case the change should probably come from asking the in-‐kind recipients additional questions around the level of sharing of the food outside the household/family, and about the use of cash freed up by the provision of assistance. It would be very useful to be able to compare the two modalities in these aspects. Before expanding the use of these questions to new groups, however, both questions would benefit from a little reworking. The question on food sharing needs to be explicit about sharing within the family (but outside the household), both those under the same roof and those living elsewhere (see Figure 1) below. The format of this question should be reviewed and tested with households. Within the CVP, the current question generates no valuable data at all: in 829 monitoring visits, there was only a single reported case of sharing outside the family – and that may well be a data entry error.



The question on the use of cash ‘freed-‐up’ by the provision of the assistance appears – at least in its English version – to be a little vague. But the intent of the question is useful and it could be applied to both modalities in a similar format.

Recommendation 3 The depth, nature and frequency of household monitoring for the CVP and the in-‐kind distributions should be equivalent. Questions about the use of the food obtained, and the impact on other aspects of household economy should appear in both forms in the same format.

Households and families

There is an important distinction to be made between households and families. A household is defined as the group of family members living under one roof and eating from the same cooking pot. However, several households from the same family often live in the same property, eating separately as a norm but sharing resources often. When this report refers to ‘family’ it will normally refer to this situation. The extended family is also an important concept: in this report this will normally mean related households living in separate properties. Food and assets are also shared within extended families, but to a lesser degree.

Figure 1: households, families and extended families

The figure above shows part of an extended family: four brothers (shown in green) who have each married and have their own families. Three of the brothers still live in the family home; one has moved out and lives nearby. Each of the household units is distinct, cooking separately from the others most of the time2. The distinction is critical when it comes to assessing the situation of a household (or family), when deciding the value of any transfer, and when trying to understand sharing between family members. The terms must be used consistently, and the tools must be applied consistently, in order to ensure meaningful data and equitable allocations. There is evidence that this is not always the case. The previous study suggested that it would be valuable to include data on the true size of the family (living together in one property) as well as the household when collecting monitoring data – even if targeting and assistance are both predicated on household sizes. This report proposes a hypothesis that while assistance is predicated on household size, levels of sharing are dependent on total family size and total family resources. If this is shown to be true, monitoring family size as well as household size may help to identify households that are especially vulnerable.

2 ‘Household’ refers to one person or groups (with or without a family relationship) who live in the same dwelling unit or part of it, who share meals and make joint provisions for food and other essentials of living. Source MoSA ,PCBS



Safety net transfer modalities and transfer values

Which transfer modality do people prefer?

Many studies and focus groups in Gaza have addressed the question of beneficiaries’ preference of modality: in-‐kind food aid, conditional transfers such as cash for work and cash vouchers, or unconditional cash transfers. The results are oddly inconsistent.

Bias, current experience, and asking a better question

It has been suggested that the outcome of the question depends on the way the question is phrased, and the discussion that preceded it, and thus reflects the bias of the questioner. Sadly, this is certainly true in some cases. It has also been suggested that the answer reflects that current modality that people experience, perhaps reflecting a degree of confidence in that option, and uncertainty that changing modality could lead to a loss of entitlement. This is certainly reflected in the responses. The linked review of unconditional cash grants for Oxfam suggested a new way of asking the question to reduce the influence of interviewer bias. Rather than asking about preferences, it asks about the situations in which each modality would be appropriate. This was done in seven focus groups during this review and the answers, below, are very consistent (and also consistent between men and women):

Table 1: perspectives of beneficiaries: when is it appropriate to use which modality?

in-‐kind food ration e-‐voucher unconditional cash

When is this modality appropriate?

During times of war and turmoil when movement is not possible For families who have no children For extended families

Applicable at all times For all Can be used for three meals Good for divorced women and widows For families who have children where it rectifies some of the lack to vitamins and minerals

Non-‐food items Medications School needs Other commodities from shop For mobile phone credit and cigarettes

Other issues Heavy transport costs It spares families a great deal of embarrassment Restores the image of father as breadwinner / provider

Good in combination

While this is interesting it could be still be seen to promote the idea that people vote for what they know: all but one of these focus groups were of cash voucher beneficiaries, many of whom had quite recently transferred from an in-‐kind distribution modality. This transition provides the likely explanation for this phenomenon.

A journey through modalities

However, this idea can be expanded a little. We know from other contexts that unconditional cash is usually the preferred option because it offers the highest levels of flexibility and dignity. In Gaza we have generally interviewed people with an experience of just food aid, or experiences of food aid and voucher but who are now on a voucher modality. To gain a better perspective, we could seek out people who used to receive vouchers but now receive rations in-‐kind. The problem is, very few of these people exist. Neither have we – in this study – interviewed those receiving unconditional cash. There is a group of people who receive unconditional cash, some of whom have received food aid in the past and some who still do. This group were the focus of the previous study mentioned above, which asked about modality preferences in the traditional manner. They expressed a strong preference for



unconditional cash – again, the modality of their experience. This group of people is made up of the very poor – on the whole, people with even fewer resources than the majority of in-‐kind and voucher assistance groups, and this may also have influenced their stated preference, as cash allows them to access things a food voucher cannot. If we see the trend for assistance in Gaza to be a journey from food aid, perhaps through a voucher modality, to an unconditional cash-‐based safety net, then preferences may be expressed in relation to how much of that journey has been experienced by a particular group of beneficiaries. If people vote for what they know, that may just be expressing that the journey, for individual beneficiaries, is going in a particular direction – but also that that direction is one that that they appreciate.

Figure 2: a journey through modalities?

This could be tested quite easily by asking the improved question in focus groups of people receiving unconditional cash support either from MoSA or from Oxfam / ECHO. This hypothesis is not suggesting that all assistance in Gaza will soon be delivered in the form of unconditional cash grants, only that the trend at the moment has been in this direction.

Is unconditional cash appropriate for WFP in Gaza?

The answer to this question depends on the objectives of the WFP assistance. It is worth noting that the broader safety net remains the responsibility of the authorities, and the Ministry of Social Affairs are developing their cash-‐based safety net in this regard. The responsibility of WFP is to provide (for non-‐refugees) a food-‐based safety net to the limit to which it is required; meeting the gap in assistance for the poorest households. In the light of this, and recognising both the political and donor constraints and the fact that food assistance does free up other household income for other items, the pragmatic answer to this question – at the current time – is probably ‘no’.

How big are the households?

For traditional in-‐kind food aid, households are gathered together into categories based on the number of members of a household, and each category receives a standard package, as this simplifies the logistics of distributions. At the current time, this is true of both the in-‐kind distributions and the CVP. There are four categories used in each modality, as shown in the chart below. Households with 1 or 2 members only are placed in Category 1; households with 3 to 5 members are placed in Category 2, and so on.



Figure 3: distribution of household size within the CVP project

This chart shows the actual household sizes of the 5554 households that receive the CVP voucher at the time of the review. It shows a roughly normal distribution of household sizes around an average value close to 5.5. It also shows the categories used both by the CVP and the in-‐kind distributions to cluster households together, which were developed to simplify the logistics of the in-‐kind distribution. The implications of this chart are twofold. The smaller effect relates to the actual average household size, which is closer to the mode than the value used for the calculations. Across all four categories, the net impact of this is that the total amount of assistance distributed is less than it should be, based on the actual total number of household members. The larger effect occurs within groups: it is most pronounced in category 1, and affects the largest number of people in category 3, but the largest combined impact is in category 2. Within this category, 8.1% of recipients of the CVP (in HH of 3: 451 households; 1353 people) receive an additional contribution equivalent to 33% of the ‘standard’ for a HH of 4. And 16.5% of recipients of the CVP (in HH of 5: 937 households; 4685 people) receive 20% less than the ‘standard’. While these inequalities are inevitable for food aid delivered at scale, they can be corrected within the CVP by providing a voucher that is calculated on the basis of actual household size rather than by clusters. In terms of the e-‐voucher system, this can be implemented within the database by increasing the number of categories to match the range of household sizes: it may have been rather harder to implement in the old, paper-‐based voucher system. The ceiling on HH size could be maintained at ten to protect against the temptation to combine households together, in an effort to increase the total amount of support provide to the family network. But as will be seen below, a higher limit may be wise, and will be needed only for a very few families. A third factor influencing the equity of the different packages has already been noted: that the effective food-‐ration size decreases as we move up through the categories. This is outside the scope of the TOR of this review, but could be addressed by modifying the in-‐kind ration sizes: a proposal to reduce this inequity is included as an annex. The overall effect of the current categorisation is that on average, fewer resources are transferred than planned, so putting it right for the voucher programme will slightly increase the average cost per HH; but it will also increase equity. It can be argued that this would increase the disparity between the in-‐kind modality and the voucher, but it is better overall to have more people receiving an equitable amount than fewer.

Recommendation 4 Cash voucher transfer values should be denominated according to actual household size rather than being clustered into groups.



Weekly top-ups

The cash voucher has been created as an alternative to an in-‐kind distribution and appears to have adopted many of the characteristics of that modality, rather than being designed from scratch. The issue of the categories of households is one example of this. Another is the monthly pattern for distribution top-‐ups. Given the perishable nature of the foods on the list of voucher items, the e-‐voucher is topped up on a weekly basis. But the planning and monitoring cycles are monthly, and the shops payment cycles are bi-‐monthly, reflecting their need to maintain cash flow. For this reason, the top-‐up period, which is referred to as weekly, is actually quarter-‐monthly. From the perspective of WFP, these cycles clearly make sense. But from the perspective of the beneficiaries and the staff of the programme, a simple weekly cycle would make more sense. At the moment, the top-‐up day is rather unpredictable to beneficiaries, staff frequently have to work at weekends, and at the end of some months the ‘week’ becomes 10 days long.

Recommendation 5 The voucher top-‐up should be done on a calendar week, every week on a Sunday, changing the total annual number of top-‐ups from 48 to 52, and revising the voucher amount accordingly. This means that some calendar months will include 5 top-‐up days.

The value of the cash voucher in 2013

The simplest way to calculate an appropriate value for the cash voucher is to apply the same transfer value as the GFD, and therefore take the daily allowances for the in-‐kind ration and cost them on the local market. If Recommendation 5 is adopted, the daily value should be multiplied by 7 to get the weekly value. If it is not, then it should be multiplied by 30/4 to get a value appropriate for 4 top-‐ups per month. The following table illustrates the calculation, using prices provided by WFP for May 2012.

Table 2: calculating value of the cash voucher from the theoretical market value of the in-‐kind ration

Item Wheat flour

Vegetable oil

Pulses (chick peas) Sugar Salt Total

Daily per capita allowance 422 g 30 g 23 g 25g 6g

Cost / kg (NIS) 2.445 9 2.33 4 1

Daily total 1.032 0.270 0.146 0.100 0.006 1.574

Weekly total 11.02

4 times a month 11.80

Recommendation 6 The redemption value of the cash voucher should be 11 NIS per person per calendar week.

Note that if Recommendation 5 is not adopted, the voucher value should be 12 NIS, four times a month.

New modalities for 2013

In addition to the current modalities – in kind distributions and the e-‐voucher -‐ WFP plan to add an additional combined modality in Gaza in 2013, and to use two indicators to allocate new households to the most appropriate modality. The revised modalities will not be applied immediately across the board, but will be used for new caseload and for re-‐allocations.



Indicators

The only indicator that selects households for inclusion in WFP’s in-‐kind and voucher programmes is that households fall below the Deep Poverty Line, which is determined by considering the cost of essential food and household expenditure. The Deep Poverty Line takes into account household consumption in three categories of goods and services: food, clothing and housing. A second indicator will be used in combination to allocate households to the most appropriate modality. The Food Consumption Score (FCS) is a standard WFP tool for measuring the diversity of the household diet. The information needed to calculate the FCS is collected as a standard in all large surveys undertaken by PCBS and the UN. It is important to recognise that the indicators for a household to be included onto a support package should not be the same as the indicators for transition or graduation off it. If an intervention aims to improve dietary diversity in a group of households, and it succeeds, removing the intervention will simply return the households to their initial state. The PMTF indicator (see below) is largely independent of food or cash assistance packages: a substantial improvement in PMT score would normally indicate a substantial improvement in the situation of the household: PMT is an appropriate indicator for graduation.

Modalities

Three different modalities are proposed for distributions from 2013, as shown in Table 3. This table assumes the adoption of the recommendations found later in this chapter.

Table 3: three proposed modalities for WFP assistance in 2013

In-‐kind general ration Cash voucher Combined assistance

A dry ration of non-‐perishable goods is distributed every 2 months Households come to a distribution point to collect their ration Households are separated into categories by size to maximise the efficiency of the distributions.

A weekly electronic voucher is topped up every week and can be spent on products from a selected range The size of the voucher will be directly determined by the number of people in the household (a change from 2012)

A ration of wheat flour based on the quantity in the in-‐kind modality, according to a HH size category, and An electronic voucher, of lower value than the Cash Voucher group, the size determined by the actual HH size. This will be a new category in 2013

Target group: those with acceptable or borderline dietary diversity (FCS) scores, falling below the deep poverty line

Target group: those low FCS scores falling below the deep poverty line, but with sufficient resources to purchase their own wheat flour.

Target group: very poor households (higher consumption gap) with poor FCS scores.

Aims to meet 70-‐90% of the household food needs in terms of calories

Aims contribute to calorific needs and improve dietary diversity. Aims to support the development of the food production sector

Aims to meet both calorific, dietary diversity, and food production sector development objectives.

If the per capita value of this ration on the local market is V

…then the per capita value of the electronic voucher is also V…

…and the value of the combined assistance is greater than V.

Households typically complement the ration with an equal amount from their own resources

Households typically complement the voucher with an equal amount from their own resources

Household resources are too limited to complement the ration effectively.

Micronutrients through fortified flour Limited choice leads to trading and selling Queuing at distribution points Large loads to carry, transport costs

Micronutrients through dairy produce and diversified diet Very low levels of trading and sharing Increased choice, more dignity; ‘invisible’ distribution

Will depend on the selected modality for the wheat flour component



Figure 4: WFP proposed modalities for 2013

The diagram on the left presents these three modalities in terms of household income (represented by the Proxy Means Test (PMT) score) and food consumption score, and illustrates the different consumption gaps for different target groups. Although the boxes in the diagram are the same size, this does not imply that the different beneficiary groups are of equal size. The concept of consumption gap is explored in more detail below.

Profiling these groups

There would be value in developing a narrative profile of typical member households in these three groups, identifying their characteristics. This profile could include typical household expenditure across a range of categories as well as mean answers to the questions in the PMTF questionnaire. This would help in the identification of households that fall outside of the norms, which would be useful in the identification of inclusion and exclusion errors. A preliminary exercise using data from the recent SEFSec survey looked at the correlation between household size and consumption gap for families below the DPL: the correlation is extremely strong. The families with the lowest PMTF scores had significantly larger families, as the table below starkly illustrates:

Table 4: PMTF and HH size for 154 non-‐refugee families below the DPL. Source SEFSec

PMTF Range 88-‐144 144-‐199 199-‐255 255-‐310 310-‐366

Number of HH 2 8 22 43 79

% of HH 1% 5% 14% 28% 51%

Average HH size 18.0 11.1 12.3 9.3 7.8

This table provides support to the idea that very large households should be considered as special cases. If the limit for HH support remains capped at 10 members, these few very large (and very poor) households might be best considered as two entities to ensure that they are receiving adequate support.

Recommendation 7 In order to have a better understanding of the caseload and support in the identification of errors of allocation, develop a detailed profile of the target groups, disaggregated by household size and consumption gap, based on existing data and supported by targeted field research.



What are people actually eating?

It is difficult to gain accurate data on how many kCal people actually consume in Gaza. The PECS studies of 2006 and 2009 contain data but there appear to be issues with the methodology. The previous MTR found that the voucher (which at that time was being piloted for a single category and was therefore for a small range of HH sizes) was providing between 34% and 40% of the food eaten in the household: focus groups of CVP beneficiaries in this study using the same participatory tools consistently found the ratio was almost exactly 50%. A proportional piling technique was used to explore this. Each sub-‐group of participants was provided with 100 large beans, and the group was asked to discuss and asked to distribute them into two piles: one representing the food the household consumes that comes from the in-‐kind or voucher assistance, and the other the food from their own resources.

Variations from the norm

Several of the focus groups held in this review were comprised of people who had recently transferred to the voucher modality from a general ration. They consistently reported that the contribution of the assistance package to their household food consumption was the same in both cases. Looking back at the time before they were transferred onto the voucher programme, one enterprising group insisted on having three categories rather than two. The third grouping – representing some 20% of the total food consumed in the household – was the food bought with the money raised from trading the in-‐kind assistance. In both cases, groups comprised of people with larger family sizes found that the ration made up a smaller contribution, down to around 45%. This finding is coherent with an analysis of the food ration (and by implication, the voucher value, as they are directly linked) across the four categories of HH size identified above. The size of the ration does not scale in a linear manner with HH size, and larger families get less per capita than smaller ones. This trend is true within each category, but also across the four categories. By adding a fifth category of HH sizes, some of the inequities could be reduced, although there would be a consequent increase in actual costs (though not in budget, which is calculated on the theoretical ration). (See Annex 4) The previous MTR also identifies a range of health problems associated with the diet in Gaza including high levels of anaemia, overweight, micronutrient deficiencies, and a trend of stunting in children under 5. While no attempt has been made to measure direct health benefits amongst beneficiaries, beneficiaries in several focus groups told stories of improvements that they attributed to the voucher programme.

Consumption gap

A consumption gap is the difference between what a household needs to consume and what it actually consumes. It can refer to the broader essential needs of a household or to food needs alone; and it can refer to the expectations of the household, or to the minimum requirements needed to stay healthy. For the purposes of this report, the consumption gap is the difference between the household’s actual consumption and the PCBS 2011 Relative Poverty Line, below which people are officially considered poor. If Gaza cannot accurately be described as a middle-‐income environment (as income opportunities are low) it certainly has middle-‐income expectations around food consumption, and displays a number of typical middle-‐income problems associated with diet.

Consumption gap for typical WFP beneficiaries

The WFP ration is said to provide between 70-‐90% of the household’s food energy needs, measured against the internationally agreed minimum of 2100 kCal per capita per day. It is based on a theoretical individual ration that would meet 92% of adult food needs. The actual range is rather



wider than this, particularly at the extremes of household size. Typical food consumption in Gaza is higher than this, and this is reflected in the finding from the participatory exercises that around half the households’ food needs came from the ration (or the voucher). Even if the assistance provides the majority of the household calories, and the own expenditure provides other components of the diet, this would suggest that typical households in Gaza are eating well over 2100 kCal per day per capita. UNRWA use a figure of 2355 kCal per capita per day as their measure of typical food consumption, but this is probably an under-‐estimate for many households. Put another way, the food consumption gap for these households would be the cost of providing an additional 11-‐43% of food on top of the provided assistance (if we are talking about standard amounts) or rather more than this (if we are talking about expectations). On the whole, most households that participated in the CVP had the resources to pay for this additional food themselves: but it came at the expense of other items. And according to the monitoring of coping strategies, most households in the CVP also cut back on food provision (either the number of meals or the size of those meals) at some point during most months.

Consumption gap for poorer households

Poorer households will have fewer resources to close the consumption gap, as will households that have additional or unusual demands on their expenditure. Households with higher than average medical expenditures due to chronic conditions are a case in point here, and they may be over-‐represented in the very poor group. Specific focus groups were set up with households from this category to explore food expenditure in this group further.

What are households spending on food?

Focus groups were specifically held to explore a number of issues, including the types of food that are purchased with the household’s own resources. As far as possible, these groups of people were homogenous to allow different profiles to be investigated. Time did not allow a comprehensive level of disaggregation. For example, it was not possible to included a geographic split, despite this having been found to be relevant in the previous MTR; neither was it possible to conduct three or four focus groups for each sub-‐category to ensure consistent findings. Proportional piling was used again: 100 beans are used to represent the household food consumption and the beans are distributed amongst different food categories. In the first focus group the beneficiaries selected the categories, but after this standard categories were imposed to make comparison between the data easier (this in part explains the absence of olive oil in the first FG). In most focus groups it was possible to do the exercise four times: separating into larger households and smaller (or men and women) and each sub-‐group looking at expenditure during the current voucher modality and the previous in-‐kind modality. When looking at the in-‐kind distributions, the focus groups identified the need for a category for dairy products. When looking at the voucher, they needed a category for flour purchase. The results of these focus group exercises are as follows:



Table 5: proportional piling in focus groups

% Flour and

baking

% Dairy produ

cts

% Chicken

meat a

nd

fish, fresh or frozen

% Fruit an

d vegetables

% Olive oil

% Tea, sug

ar and

macaron

i

% Can

ned go

ods an

d pu

lses

# FG Location type Gender

HH Size

PMTF score modality

1 1 Rural M

< DPL voucher 23 15 25

25 12

2 1 Rural F

< DPL voucher 23 17 28

25 7

3 1 Rural M

< DPL in-‐kind 19 19 25 16 9 12

4 1 Rural F

< DPL in-‐kind 20 12 35

23 10

5 2 Urban F L < DPL voucher 16 16 21 18 16 13

6 2 Urban F S < DPL voucher 30 24 24 6 10 6

7 3 Urban F L < DPL voucher 20 10 22 14 17 17

8 3 Urban F S < DPL voucher 20 15 25 10 20 10

9 3 Urban F S < DPL in-‐kind 10 30 20 14 16 10

10 3 Urban F L < DPL in-‐kind 11 16 26 9 20 18

11 4 Urban M

< DPL in-‐kind 21 20 27 7 9 16

12 4 Urban M

< DPL voucher 8 13 27 16 18 18

13 4 Urban M

< DPL voucher 20 34 16 6 15 9

14 5 Urban -‐ S <<DPL in-‐kind 11 9 23 13 29 15

15 5 Urban -‐ L <<DPL in-‐kind 20 6 18 10 28 18

16 6 Urban -‐ S <<DPL voucher 20 10 38 8 12 12

17 6 Urban -‐ L <<DPL voucher 20 10 34 8 18 10

Notes. 1. Most focus groups consisted of 12 or more people so were split into two for the purposes of this exercise.

The split was either along gender lines or on HH size. 2. The ‘rural’ location was in Dayr al Balah, and could perhaps better be described as peri-‐urban or mixed. 3. The appellation <<DPL relates to focus groups that were specifically pulled together from households from

both voucher and in-‐kind beneficiaries, who might be eligible for the proposed ‘combined in-‐kind / voucher approach, and whose PMTF scores are amongst the lowest.

What are the very poor households spending on food?

Table 5 shows that the pattern of expenditure of the very poor is similar to the poor, with significantly lower expenditure on meat, and slightly higher on vegetables. For very poor households receiving in-‐kind assistance, [# 14 and 15] reported that it contributed just 25%-‐30% of the total. For the CVP recipients, the large family subgroup said the same, [#17] although the small family subgroup [# 16] reported the same 50-‐50 split as before. At first sight this is counter-‐intuitive: should the very poor households not be spending less from their own pockets? But given that food is a necessity, we should in fact expect the amount of own contributions to be the same in order to make up the amount seen as necessary. What seems likely is that other important household expenditure is being sacrificed instead, and the perceived expenditure on food is greater. It would be helpful to pursue this with more groups to see if the answers are consistent. It would also be interesting to extend the exercise to look not only at the breakdown of the food expenditure in these households, but also at the breakdown of all household expenditure. This would probably also provide more consistent results.



Looking at other datasets

Oxfam have some data that considers broader household expenditure, which is collected as part of the monitoring of an unconditional cash transfer, provided to highly vulnerable households as a complementary intervention. Some of these households are also recipients of the CVP, so in this case the unconditional cash acts as a model of sorts for the proposed combined modality (see below). The detailed expenditure data is available in the review of that project. While it only looks at the reported expenditure of the cash transfer rather than the whole household income, it seems reasonable to assume that the proportions are similar. Overall, it suggests that for this group of very poor households, 47% of their cash expenditure went on food. Combining this with the previous findings we can suggest that the household economy of very poor households receiving assistance can be split into three roughly equal parts:

• Food provided through the assistance

• Expenditure on food

• Expenditure on non-‐food, health, education etc. If there were no assistance, and food remained the priority, food expenditure would consume the whole of the household income of these very poor households, leaving nothing for other essentials. In a very real way, food assistance frees up household income to spend on other essentials: health care, education, travel, clothing and so on. The current WFP assistance packages (both in-‐kind and cash voucher) aim to meet 70-‐90% of the nutritional needs of the beneficiaries. For the very poorest of these, a larger total contribution would clearly be appropriate, freeing up limited household income for other needs.

Considering an enhanced package for the poorest

It seems clear from the data and the focus groups that the assistance provided to the very poorest is currently insufficient to have a significant impact. On what basis might an enhanced assistance package for these households be derived? This question actually conceals a range of other questions, and they do not all have readily accessible or convenient answers. So before tackling them, let us ask: what characteristics would we like to see in such as system? The following list is offered in answer to that question:

• It should take as its start point the concept of a food-‐based safety net

• It should target households based on objective criteria

• The value of the assistance should reflect the situation and needs of the household

Issues with targeting

The current WFP proposal considers a package of enhanced support that is made available to a fixed number of households, starting with the poorest and working upwards. While this approach is needs-‐based, the upper boundary of support is not: it is arbitrary – unless the number of households is identified on the basis of some other objective criterion. An alternative is to identify a new threshold, below which enhanced assistance would be offered. There are challenges and risks associated with this: on what basis should such a threshold be identified? Having been set, could it displace the DPL as the threshold for all assistance and exclude less-‐poor households that clearly need help? There is an understandable reluctance to adopt an additional, lower threshold.

Issues with the value

There are two broad approaches that can be considered in terms of setting the value of the enhanced assistance. The first – used for the GFD and the main voucher assistance – looks at food needs in the household, and can be extended to consider typical food use in the household. That is: the current WFP assistance is provided on the basis of an individual monthly ration that would provide 70-‐90% of theoretical food needs. This could be increased to 100% of food needs, or further increased to 100% of typical food use.



The second approach is to look at the consumption gaps of a range of households, and consider the assistance provided in this light. We can look at the resultant consumption gap after the assistance, or the size of the assistance as a proportion of the consumption gap. This is an attractive idea: it potentially allows the assistance to be made more specific to the household’s situation. But it brings challenges: should WFP assistance be aligned to the whole consumption gap or focused on the food component? And if the assistance is set at, say, 50% of the consumption gap, is this not just another arbitrary target? What logic supports it?

Using food needs and food use to set the value of the enhanced assistance package.

We can expand the information laid out in Table 2 to increase the value of the assistance from 92% of theoretical food needs to 100% of typical food use. Typical food use in Gaza is considered to be 2355cKal per capita per day, as opposed to food needs of 2100kCal -‐ although the focus groups conducted in this review suggest the real figure is higher.

Table 6: calculating the value of the voucher component of the combined package based on typical food use

Item Wheat flour

Vegetable oil



Unit kg kg kg kg Kg

Cost / unit (NIS) 2.445 9 2.33 4 1

Daily total 1.032 0.270 0.146 0.100 0.006 1.553

Increase from 92% of food needs to 100% of food use 1.294 0.339 0.183 0.125 0.008 1.948

Weekly total 13.63


This would suggest an enhanced assistance package of 60 NIS per capita month, compared to a standard package of 48 NIS: an increase of 25%.

Impact on consumption gaps for different households

Table 4 above set out five ranges of PMTF score. The table below considers the impact of the standard and the enhanced package on five imaginary non-‐refugee households, situated in the middle of each range: all below the Deep Poverty Line and qualifying for WFP assistance.

Table 7: standard and enhanced assistance packages as % of consumption gap (NIS / capita /month)

HH A HH B HH C HH D HH E

Household income 116 171 227 283 338

Relative Poverty Line 459 459 459 459 459

Consumption gap 343 288 232 176 121

Standard assistance package 48 48 48 48 48

Revised consumption gap 295 240 184 128 73

Assistance as % of initial consumption gap 14% 17% 21% 27% 40%

Enhanced assistance package 60 60 60 60 60





These calculations suggest two findings. The first is that the enhanced assistance would be appropriate for the first three imaginary households, A, B and C. The second is that the amount of the enhanced assistance is probably too low in relation to the observed consumption gaps even after the assistance is provided. This concurs with the findings of the focus groups and the previous evaluation. If we accept, then, that safety net provided to these households must look a little beyond the pure food needs (or that typical food needs have been under-‐estimated), let us increase the value of the enhanced assistance to 50% more than the standard assistance, and apply this to households A, B and C – the poorest 20% of those qualifying for WFP assistance.

Table 8: proposed standard and enhanced assistance packages

HH A HH B HH C HH D HH E

Household income 116 171 227 283 338

Relative Poverty Line 459 459 459 459 459

Consumption gap 343 288 232 176 121

Assistance package 72 72 72 48 48



If there is no ceiling to household size, including the enhanced assistance for these groups represents a budgetary increase of 14% over providing all households with the standard assistance package.

Recommendation 8 Assistance for the very poorest needs to reflect their greater consumption gap, and should seek to close the gap by around the same degree as the standard assistance, to free up household finances for other essentials. The value of the enhanced assistance should be 150% of the standard assistance: 17 NIS per person per calendar week.

Note that if Recommendation 5 is not adopted, the assistance value should be 18 NIS, four times a month.

A combined approach

The targeting for the voucher approach initially steered away from the very poor, recognising that the main food expenditure of voucher recipients would be wheat flour bought in bulk in the marketplace, as is clearly demonstrated by the data in Table 5. It was assumed – correctly – that the very poor would not have the resources to do this. The table below uses the fact that 1 kg of flour makes around 30 small pita breads, of the sort sold in the CVP programme. It demonstrates that buying bread at the supermarket is slightly more expensive than buying flour for home baking, and that buying flour in bulk is much cheaper than either. (It does not include the cost of fuel for baking).

Table 9: comparison of wheat flour and bread prices

Wheat flour (wholesaler) Wheat flour (supermarket) Bread (supermarket)

Sold as 50 kg 1 kg ~50 pieces (3 kg)

Price 120 NIS 4 NIS 7.5 NIS

Amount of flour needed 1.67 kg

Cost / kg flour 2.4 NIS 4 NIS 4.5 NIS



Putting this another way: how much bread can I have for each 10 NIS? If I buy the bread I get 67 pieces. If I buy flour in 1kg bags and make my own, I get 75 pieces. I buy flour in 50kg bags I get 125 pieces for each 10 NIS. There is a clear benefit to all households to be able to access flour in bulk. There is considerable variation in flour prices depending on source and quality: WFP flour, imported legally and fortified, is at the expensive end of the range. There is a risk that beneficiaries of the voucher programme, especially those with limited means of their own, currently struggle to access wheat flour. They are able to buy rice, bread and wheat flour in 1kg bags using their voucher, of course, and the following table shows the amounts of money redeemed for these three commodities in the first 4 months of 2012.

Table 10: CVP purchases of staples, January – April 2012

Commodity Wheat flour Bread Rice

NIS 25,152 253,156 627,829

Calculated kg 6,288 9,262 83,710

Beneficiaries were asked about preferences around the provision of bread and flour and the results were mixed: some preferred to have flour and make their own bread, others said that it was a lot of work and not possible during power cuts.

The proposal

The value of a combined approach, then, would be to allow the very poor to access high quality flour at good prices, while WFP maintain the cost efficiencies associated with bulk purchase and supply, all the while maintaining the benefits of the programme in terms of beneficiary dietary diversity and the promotion of the local food sector. This approach would be used for the poorest households with poor and borderline FCS scores, and is shown in Figure 4 above. It maintains the flexibility and choice of the voucher, maintains the positive contribution to dietary diversity, but ensures cost-‐effective access to fortified wheat flour. The approach is to provide wheat flour in the amounts of the standard ration, and provide a top-‐up voucher to ensure dietary diversity. In line with Recommendation 8, the value of the total assistance would be larger than mainstream voucher, but the value of the voucher component would be smaller. The table below outlines the calculations used to determine the proposed value of the cash transfer component of the combined approach.

Table 11: calculating the value of the voucher component of the combined package

Item Wheat flour

Vegetable oil



Cost / kg (NIS) 2.445 9 2.33 4 1

Daily total 1.032 0.270 0.146 0.100 0.006 1.574

50% increase for the poorest HH 2.361

Subtract the wheat flour given in-‐kind -‐1.032 1.329

Weekly total 9.303


Recommendation 9 Option A. The combined voucher for the beneficiaries with the largest consumption gap should have two parts. The wheat flour component should be of the same size as the in-‐kind distribution. The voucher component should be 9 NIS per capita per week.




An alternative to distributions: an enhanced voucher

The simplest way to provide the wheat component is for the beneficiaries to attend the regular in-‐kind distributions. This is effective, but it reduces the elements of choice and dignity that are the hallmark of the successful voucher programme. An alternative would be to provide a larger voucher as per Recommendation 4 and allow the voucher beneficiaries (all of them) to access high quality wheat flour at wholesale prices as an item on the standard menu of items. It is understood that WFP cannot monetise the food aid, but there are alternatives that would allow increased flexibility and savings for all the voucher beneficiaries. These are explored below. The value of this voucher would be 17 NIS per week, based on the calculations in Table 8 above. If the top-‐up remained at 4 times per month the value should be 18 NIS. The additional cost to WFP would be modest, as the price from miller to wholesaler would reflect the WFP purchasing price, and the wholesalers’ mark-‐up would be passed on to the beneficiaries as it is with other products. The beneficiaries would still be able to access wheat flour far more cheaply than they can at the moment. When WFP is able to buy cheaper flour on the international markets, as it can some of the time, the cost increase for this component remains justified in terms of access within the framework of the voucher modality and the support to the Gaza food-‐processing sector.

Recommendation 10 Option B -‐ preferred. The value of the enhanced voucher should be 17 NIS per capita per week. Fortified wheat flour from WFP millers is placed on the list of items for which the voucher can be exchanged, at 25kg and 50kg sizes. The flour is not a compulsory item.


Options for adding wheat flour to the voucher items

Recommendation 10 could be implemented in two ways, both of which would require changes to the current management of the assistance, but both of which would restore the aspects of choice and dignity to the beneficiaries, which would be lost if Recommendation 9 were implemented. In both approaches, existing WFP millers in Gaza would be contracted to produce flour to the same standards with the same controls. The controls are important as they reflect constraints placed upon WFP over the source of commodities. The amount of flour contracted will be set within a range initially, and refined over a period of time as the demand becomes clearer. The initial demand range should be between 50% and 100% of the in-‐kind ration. Wheat flour is not typically sold in small supermarkets. It takes up large amounts of shelf space for the likely turnover and profit margin, and it requires substantial storage or rapid turnover. Some CVP shops, but not all, have additional storage space close to the premises. The cost of a bag of wheat flour is more than the cost of all current and most proposed vouchers. This can be addressed by requiring the millers to produce flour in 25kg bags (at a small premium) and simultaneously by allowing the voucher to accumulate over several weeks, rather than requiring it to be redeemed in full in the week of issue. In both options, the traders would be able to sell the wheat flour to all customers at or below the agreed price ceiling, but would be monitored to ensure that stock levels are adequate, as they are for shops.

The wholesaler option

• Wholesalers (including market traders, bakers) are identified in the same manner as shops, against set criteria, and agree to work within similar rules to the shops.

• The rules of the voucher are changed so that beneficiaries can redeem the voucher value between two locations, one shop and one wholesaler, spending the whole amount in either location or spreading it between both.



The supermarket option

• Shops are given the option to add larger (25kg and/or 50kg) bags of fortified wheat flour to their stocks, and beneficiaries are given the option to move between shops if their shop does not join the scheme.

• Shops are encouraged to work together to arrange joint purchase and distribution from wholesalers, allowing high turnover of relatively small amounts of wheat flour in 25kg bags.

Selecting the best option

The choice between these three options (Option A in Recommendation 9, Option B in Recommendation 10 through wholesalers and Option B through the existing shops) would need to be made in an informed manner after consultation with the existing shopkeepers, the millers and some potential wholesalers. The two shopkeepers consulted as part of this review stated that they would be interested in this approach. The options are not exclusive, but as both require additional work to be done in preparation, they should be compared and one should be selected and perhaps piloted. Neither option would represent any loss of trade to existing suppliers, and both would serve to increase and support local markets. In both cases concerted efforts would be needed to communicate the revised options clearly with beneficiaries, and monitoring would be necessary to observe changes in behaviour as a result.

Paper controls

The current monitoring system has a paper-‐based second layer of control at the shop level: shopkeepers receive a printed list of their beneficiaries and their entitlements, and this is signed off when the voucher is exchanged for goods. It is the electronic system that authorises the exchange: if this system is down for any reason the beneficiary cannot redeem the voucher. In the wholesaler option above, where the voucher could be exchanged in two locations, this secondary paper system could be maintained, but only as a record, not as a control.

Risks

There is a risk that the price of maintaining choice is that households but large amount of wheat flour, perhaps for trade, and the impact of improved dietary diversity is lost. It will be easy to build flags into the monitoring system to identify households exhibiting such behaviour and then to follow up. It seems unlikely to be a major problem for two reasons. The first relates to the high levels of enthusiasm that beneficiaries display for the dairy produce accessed through the voucher. The second relates to the likely and reported reasons for the trade in in-‐kind wheat flour: to gain preferred commodities. If such commodities are available through the voucher already, the motivation to trade will be reduced.

Recommendation 11 In order to allow the economical purchase of wheat flour in bulk, the voucher management arrangements be altered to allow the voucher to accumulate through one calendar month. By the end of the month the entire voucher must be redeemed. Beneficiaries could be sent an SMS with their balance periodically.



Summarising the three options for the combined approach

Table 12: summarising the three options for the combined approach

Standard voucher Reduced voucher plus in-‐kind

Enhanced voucher with wholesaler option

Enhanced voucher with shop option

11 NIS per capita week

9 NIS per capita week plus in-‐kind flour



Recommendation 6 Recommendation 8 Recommendation 9 Recommendation 10

Easiest to manage Requires split location for voucher redemption

Requires wholesalers to join scheme

Requires organisation of shops

50kg bags New 25kg bags New 25kg bags

Loss of choice and dignity Maintain choice and dignity Requires additional monitoring of the origin of the flour

Maintain choice and dignity Requires additional monitoring of the origin of the flour

A bonus for the current voucher beneficiaries

On average, the current voucher beneficiaries only bought a little more than one 1kg bag of flour each over the last 4 months. This presumably reflects the high price of flour in the shops. Ten times as much money was spent on bread. Let us imagine that a 25kg bag of flour was sold at 65 NIS (compare around 100-‐120 for 50kg). This amount of money would buy only 16 bags of 1kg each: a 36% loss. For those beneficiaries who wish to buy flour in bulk (and our focus groups tell us that those who can afford to, do) this represents a huge saving.



Targeting and the PMTF

Introduction to the Proxy Means Test

The tool is based on demonstrated statistical correlations between actual household income and a large number of other indicators that are much easier and more objective to measure. Many such indicators are compared, and the strength of the correlation (if any) determines the weighting placed on that variable in the final calculation. Once household data is collected through a questionnaire, an algorithm generates a result which is a proxy for household income: this is then compared to identified income thresholds and used to determine the household’s entitlement to assistance, normally placing the household into one of three categories, two of which qualify for assistance. While the selected indicators can be inferred from the questions asked, not all these questions carry a weighting, and the weightings remain internal.

Benefits of the PMTF

The PMTF is relatively cheap to run and reasonably accurate. The scale of food aid and social safety net assistance in the oPt makes these essential characteristics for a targeting methodology. It is not used for all types of assistance, nor would this be appropriate. A wide range of organisations provide assistance at a variety of scales. Much of this assistance is provided on the basis of other types of targeting, some based on specific characteristics (female headed households, farmers in the border area), some through institutions (old people’s homes, schools) and some on community-‐based approaches. While the PMT is common to most of the large-‐scale assistance and embedded within the larger surveys undertaken by PCBS, there is not a common approach to identifying those to be tested. All refugee households, for example, are tested and re-‐tested by UNRWA on a rolling cycle, although this is a slow process. For other groups, the process of preliminary selection can be quite varied.

Variations on a theme

It has been suggested that it is appropriate for there to be a single PMT formula for the whole of the oPt, and the harmonisation of the various approaches is a stated goal. However, the reality is that at the current time, there are a range of formulas and weightings under the PMT methodology, and a diversity of thresholds used to differentiate sub-‐groups of the population.

WFP and MoSA have a single PMTF for the whole of the resident population of oPt. UNRWA have a PMTF for Gaza and a separate calculation for the West Bank. MoSA and the PCBS identified a poverty line based on the food and essential household items for a standard Palestinian household of 2 adults and 3 children. MoSA use a ‘deep poverty line’ based on the cost of food, clothing and shelter for a household of 2 adults and 3 children: this is used by WFP as their main targeting criterion. UNRWA recognise two additional poverty lines that they describe as ‘abject’ and ‘absolute’ poverty, reported as being based on per capita income of approximately 6.1 NIS and 15.7 NIS respectively.

These thresholds are all measured in different units, which adds to the potential for confusion. In the diagram below, they have been converted to a common unit: income per capita month, in NIS. This common unit is used throughout this review.



Figure 5: a wealth of poverty lines

Towards harmonisation

The idea of a common PMTF seems sensible, but it is not entirely feasible. For reasons that will be explored below, a common PMTF for Gaza and the West Bank is unrealistic and will generate higher errors of inclusion and exclusion than two independent variants. The situation in Gaza and the West Bank are sufficiently different that not only will the weightings of the questions be different; the actual questions may well be different also. There is no need for a different PMT formula for refugees and for residents. The external conditions in which they live, their opportunities for employment, their asset base and so on depend not on their refugee status but on their location.

Reflections on the MoSA PMTF

The PMTF has been the subject of some debate, which is driven by reports of inconsistent results, and fuelled by the slightly odd reluctance to widely share the formula by which the result is generated from the questions. The usual challenge raised against the PMTF is that it is strongly asset-‐based, and thus discriminates against the ‘new poor’: those who had jobs and assets before the closure, and now have a good house and a TV set but no income and little food. The challenge to the PMTF is worth considering. The chart below (reproduced from the linked review of Oxfam’s unconditional cash transfers) groups the PMT questions into types, and combines their individual weightings to provide a score for the group. The allocation of questions into groups is shown within Annex 2. Although generated statistically based on observed correlations across the oPt, the balance of questions seems intuitively wrong for the Gaza context.



Figure 6: the balance of PMTF questions by category

Most of the questions used to collect the data relate to a range of typical household assets or to household demographics. The questions examine the existence of assets, but not changes or asset sales, and the only question about productive assets relates to a car. There are many more common productive assets in Gaza that might reward observation. Over a third of the scoring relates to household and fixed assets, which supports the common charge made against the weighting of the tool; less than 20% relates to income, expenditure and production, and then only indirectly. Human capital might be

under-‐represented in the context of the West Bank, but it appears to have too high a weighting for the Gaza situation, where master’s degrees are so common, and jobs so rare. These observations strongly support the UNRWA solution of having a different set of weightings – and very possibly a slightly different set of questions – in the West Bank and in Gaza.

Recommendation 12 WFP should work towards harmonisation of the PMT between refugee and non-‐refugee populations, and the development of separate indicators and weightings for Gaza and the West Bank.

PMTF – better guidance for enumerators

The nature of the questions

The nature of the PMTF requires that it uses yes/no questions to investigate the situation of the households. The reasons for this appear to be due to the nature of the algorithm and that the answers are completely objective: a household either owns a television or it does not; and that generating any sort of scale would be inevitably subjective. However, there is a significant difference between owning an old black-‐and-‐white portable, and having a modern flat-‐screen plasma TV. Indeed, the field workers interviewed would report a household as having a television or a computer even if it was not functioning.

Creating a meaningful scale for each of these questions would be challenging, and the answers would be subjective: this would not be a solution., even if the PMT formula could allow it. If the question must be asked in a yes/no format, at least there should be clarity on what constitutes a ‘no’. A non-‐functioning asset is not an asset.

Households and families

Assistance is provided at the level of the household. A household is defined as the group of people who normally cook and eat together (see Figure 1). Where several households from the same family live together in a single property, each household is assessed separately. In such situations, levels of sharing are significantly higher than when close relatives live in separate properties. This is true of food, of course, but also of household assets. It is very possible that questions such as ‘does the household have a computer’ could generate false positive responses in this context. It is clearly not appropriate to use access to assets shared at a family level as a proxy for income at a household level, if those assets actually belong to another household within the family.



Guidance

PMTF questions used very widely be a range of actors within Gaza. It is clearly important to ensure that they are used in a standard manner. Better guidance could be provided to data collectors and enumerators to ensure that they do not include non-‐functioning assets, and the source and ownership of all assets should be checked before they are included. Where an asset has been gifted or provided on a long-‐term loan to the household, then it should be included; if it is owned by another household within the same family in the same property, it should not.

Figure 7: Do you have a computer?

Recommendation 13 The training provided to all data collectors should be reviewed to ensure that assets are only recorded if (a) they are functional and (b) they are owned by the actual household under assessment and not shared within the family while being owned by another household.

PMTF thresholds: inclusion and exclusion

Figure 8: when will PMTF provide misleading answers?

PMTF is known to provide a reasonable correlation with actual household income (or expenditure: for poor households with stable debt and no savings the two are equivalent). Where there is a variance between the PMT score and the actual, this will only be important for households that are close to an assistance threshold, and when the variance is in the direction of that threshold. This is illustrated in Figure 8. In the current situation, a householder who is unhappy with the outcome of the scoring can apply to complete the PMT interview again and have the results recalculated. This is helpful when the error results from data collection or data entry, but does not provide any benefits in cases



where the PMT formula generates an erroneous result on the basis of the actual household circumstances. To properly assess such households an additional mechanism is needed. While it seems likely that only a relatively small proportion of households would need to be re-‐checked by this mechanism, the actual proportion is not known at this time. An analysis of the SEFSec data for non-‐refugees in Gaza, which includes both actual household expenditure and PMTF questions, suggests that the PMTF process produces errors as follows when measured against actual household expenditure:

• a net inclusion error from people above the deep poverty line into the category below the deep poverty line

• a net exclusion error from the category of the very poor into the category immediately below the deep poverty line.

A human over-ride or a second tool?

The change in job title from ‘Social Worker’ to ‘Field Monitor’ is indicative of a change in approach with the adoption of the PMTF. Yet the field staff have significant experience of poor Gaza households and this knowledge and experience is lost to the current system. The previous, linked report makes a recommendation that the PMTF should include some form of human over-‐ride, and this recommendation informed the development of the TOR for this study. The term ‘human over-‐ride’ suggests a loss of the objective nature of the PMTF and this is not what was intended. What is needed is a secondary process, to be used in a small, prioritised number of cases, that provides a more accurate measure of household means, although this is likely to come at a higher cost. The UNRWA PMT format asks a question of the enumerator: to which category do you feel this household belongs? This question is not weighted, but when the answer disagrees with the formula, it could be used as a trigger for further investigation even before a complaint is made, and would be especially helpful to identify errors of inclusion.

Recommendation 14 The PMTF form should include a question at the end in which the enumerator is asked their opinion as to which category the household belongs. Discrepancy between this and the calculated result should be a trigger for review.

Characteristics of a post-PMTF review mechanism

What are the characteristics would we like the review mechanism to demonstrate? The following are suggested:

• It should be triggered by human wisdom;

• it should remain objective nonetheless;

• It should be as cost-‐effective as possible, and

• It should protect the staff whose role it is to administer. Reviewing PMTF queries requires an investment of time and energy. The first stage is to revisit the questionnaire and re-‐enter the data to ensure accuracy. But the second stage is more time consuming, and some means for prioritisation would be helpful. To do this, the current archive of reviewed cases can be explored.

Documenting disputed results

In every case where there is a dispute, a report should be produced. Many such cases have already been documented. A qualitative analysis of these documented cases will identify the key elements that should be recorded as standard.



One element of this will be the type of dispute: the most common will be a householder who feels that they have been wrongly excluded from assistance, but there will be others. Once a consistent reporting framework is in place with standard fields, this will generate a dataset that will be amenable to quantitative analysis, which can then inform the process of reducing errors in the future.

Looking at data based alternatives

If a sufficient dataset is available (and the PECS survey and the SEFSec survey together probably suffice) that includes both actual household income/expenditure and PMTF scores, then it could be analysed in the following manner:

• An arbitrary range of thresholds could be set, against which to test

• Actual means and PMTF can be compared in the region close to the threshold

• For cases where the allocation would be wrong, a range of other variables and proxies could be examined including HFIAS, FCS and the Gaza CSI.

• If strong correlations are found, these can be included in the standard fields for analysis mentioned above.

Prioritising reviews

Being able to rate cases against the standard variables that cause concern, and against the opinion of the Social Worker will provide a means to prioritise cases for review. The proposed review process is set out below.

PMTF review: measuring actual household means

If the PMT provides a proxy for household means, the most accurate alternative for cases in which it may have failed would simply be to measure actual income, expenditure and consumption. This is entirely possible and effective formats exist, although such interviews take longer than the 10-‐15 minutes typically used for PMTF. In the Gaza context, these would need to look carefully at all sources of income, as well as loans, debt and borrowing, and gifts of food, clothing and money within the family. Wider sources of gifts should also be examined. To provide a cross-‐check, a parallel exercise should be undertaken to look at expenditure, gifts to others, and the repayment of debt. This should again be cross-‐checked against consumption levels. If done on a form, the form should be very carefully designed to allow an immediate cross check of the totals and follow up any anomalies. However, rather than being done as a paper exercise, this could perhaps be done through a specialised application on a laptop, tablet or even a smartphone, to ensure that the various reported components do actually correlate, and to prompt the questioner to follow up apparent inconsistencies. The cost of the hardware will quickly be recovered in saved time and avoided repeat interviews when the data does not add up. The software can be developed locally at low cost – a well-‐designed Excel spreadsheet or similar would suffice. While the interview itself takes longer than a PMT interview, this should be seen in the context of the overall time for the household visit including travel and introductions, and the fact that this will only be done for a reduced sub-‐set of the whole. This exercise should not take place during Ramadan or close to major festivals.



PMTF score validation review: who should do it?

The PMTF score validation review should be undertaken by two people: a senior field monitor from each of WFP and Ma’an. They should endeavour to interview the head of the household and a senior female household member together if possible. Where aspects of the responses are inconsistent, they should be revisited in situ until the discrepancies can be resolved.

Recommendation 15 When it is required, the PMTF score validation review process should be undertaken jointly by WFP and Ma’an senior field officers to spread the responsibility. A standard format for measuring household economy will be used, ideally in a portable electronic format that allows for immediate cross-‐referencing of the various components.

PMTF as a criterion for targeting and transition

The voucher programme has a real and measurable impact on household dietary diversity, but that impact is sustained only as long as the programme lasts. Given the nature of the questions used to generate the PMT Score, this indicator is fairly immune from the influence of the programme. This suggests that PMTF Score can be a helpful indicator for both entry to the programme and for transition off it. Food Consumption Scores should only be used for targeting, not graduation.



Cost effectiveness and efficiency of the vouchers

The 2010 review of the cost-‐effectiveness of voucher-‐based interventions in the West Bank in May 2010 presents the following definition, based on the WFP Programme Guidance Manual.

…cost effectiveness is defined as a comparison of all costs and benefits, not all of which can be measured in monetary terms, and where cost efficiency is one key element. Cost efficiency measures input costs against outputs in monetary terms.

In other words, cost effectiveness is a broader concept than cost efficiency, and includes cost efficiency as one element in its analytical framework. This review uses a range of tools to explore the concept of cost effectiveness, and these were followed to some degree in the MTR of the voucher project in Gaza dated March 2011. The same tools are considered below.

Alpha values

To quote again from the West Bank review of 2010: WFP has traditionally been using the alpha analysis to compare relative cost efficiency between in-‐kind assistance and cash/voucher-‐based interventions. This is a simple and effective way of arriving at a reliable indicator of cost efficiency which is determined by dividing the cost of a given commodity at a retail outlet close to the beneficiary by the cost of WFP procuring, shipping and delivering that same commodity to the beneficiary.

In essence, the ratio of cost of the commodity on the local market and the cost of the same commodity to WFP. The review goes on to demonstrate comprehensively that it is significantly cheaper for WFP to provide goods in kind than it is for the same commodities to be provided through a voucher redeemed on the local market. The review presents a range of possible values for alpha from 1.3 to 2.33, calculated in different ways against different approaches. For those beneficiaries with acceptable food consumption scores, the in-‐kind distribution is a cost effective way to meet their consumption gap.

WFP objectives

If the sole purpose of the WFP programme was to put calories on the table, this analysis would be appropriate. However, the goals of the EMOP 200298 are stated as follows:

1. Meet immediate food needs and enhance food consumption and dietary diversity of the most vulnerable and food-‐insecure non-‐refugee population through in-‐kind and voucher assistance. 2. Support the PA safety net through tools aimed at predicting and reducing hunger, and using WFP purchasing power to expand the domestic production of the Palestinian economy.

The logframe goes on to set targets for improved food consumption scores, the proportion of food purchased locally, and an increase in sales volume in local shops. The items available for exchange with the voucher are chosen to support these objectives.

Apples and oranges

The description of the alpha analysis makes explicit reference to comparing the same commodity. If two different commodities or food baskets are compared, the analysis makes little sense – especially if the different baskets exist to meet different objectives. This begs the idea of a reverse alpha taking the voucher as the standard and asking: what would it cost for WFP to provide the in-‐kind equivalent? That is, a weekly distribution of mixed commodities including trays of eggs, cheese and yoghurt, with an intact cold chain. The calculation has not been attempted, but the answer will certainly be considerably less than 1.



Quantitative and qualitative multiplier effects

The May 2010 review goes on to explore some other more appropriate ways to consider of cost effectiveness, and considers the knock-‐on and multiplier effects of the voucher approach on the basis of considerable field work in the West Bank context. It generally finds the impacts to be positive. The Mid-‐Term Review of the CVP builds on this analysis and extends it to the Gaza context. This review has not had the time to replicate these findings in detail and the field visits to manufacturers were not comprehensive: only three producers were visited, and no dairy farms. But in the absence of any contrary evidence it can endorse them, and add some additional qualitative perspectives as follows.

Calculation of M

One way to calculate the multiplier effect is to measure the increase in turnover at each point in the value chain, as a result of the project. For example, CVP shops reported increased sales as a result of the programme. The multiplier effect provides the means to quantify the increase in turnover in the shops, generated by the additional business brought through the vouchers. The multiplier effect is calculated using the formula M=1/(1-‐S)

…where S is the percentage increase in turnover as a result of the intervention. Unfortunately the data to measure this for the CVP shops is not available – see Recommendation 1.

M for producers of dairy products

Three producers of dairy products were visited, of the six that provide goods to the CVP project shops. They were asked about their levels of production now and before the CVP, and the proportion of any increase that they could attribute to CVP sales. Turnover is measured in litres of milk, and the CVP was consistently reported to have increased daily milk consumption by around 100% or slightly more:

Table 13: pre-‐CVP, current and planned milk consumption

#

Milk consumption pre CVP (litres per day)

Increase in consumption attributed to the CVP (litres per day)

Current milk consumption (litres per day)

Number of dairy farmers supplying (households)

Planned expansion

(litres per day)

1 300-‐400 1050 3000-‐4000 8 (including 2 large ones)

10,000?

2 800 700 1500 5 2000-‐3000

3 350 400 750 4-‐5 -‐

Note: Producer 2 is currently stalled from CVP as he has no municipal permit – a requirement only recently introduced (He has permits relating to the quality of his product). He will be back online in around 2 months working from an expanded premises. These figures in the second column relate to the time when he was providing commodities to CVP shops. The nature of the indicator M is that it works quite well for modest increases in production, but as the increase approaches 100% of the original value, M tends to infinity. For large increases such as these, a different indicator would be needed.

Case Study: manufacturer 1 and an additional multiplier effect

Dairy manufacturer 1 took full advantage of the opportunity and kept prices low and quality high. Increase in volume presumably made up for the lower profits: the producer moved to a larger site close to the milk producers and set up a temporary factory in a small building. Volumes increased again, and a much larger building is under construction on the same site.



He is confident that the market can absorb the additional production, and has moved into new products, some of which are not associated with the CVP project. Some of the increased production is directly associated with the beneficiaries but much is additional. This is attributed to a growing confidence in Palestinian products. The CVP was specifically associated with this trend: “having my product on a WFP list of approved products is like a stamp of quality”. This is an additional and unanticipated multiplier effect.

Trends in the consumption of Palestinian products

The shop monitoring data asks shopkeepers to estimate the proportion of Palestinian dairy products they stock. The question is fairly vague and no guidance is given but we can presume that it is asked in a fairly consistent manner: the trend information it produces should be relevant. The question is asked of all shop owners each month. The answers can be seen on the chart below.

Figure 9: trends in the proportion of Palestinian dairy products carried by CVP shops

Since the introduction of a revised data capture system in January 2010, it is also possible to monitor the specific amounts of Palestinian goods bought using the vouchers, also separating produce from the West Bank and Gaza separately. Wheat flour is milled locally and bread made locally so these are both included in the list of local produce. However the data is from too short a period to convincingly demonstrate a trend.

Job creation

The shop monitoring form also asks questions about employment creation. The questions asked are not very specific in terms of the reporting period and may not be asked in a consistent manner. The baseline for the question is not explicit: it is possible that staff recruited in one month are being re-‐reported in subsequent months. Even if the total number is suspect the trend is again clear: the shops have taken on new staff members. Interviews with shopkeepers confirm this, and the fact that such staff are not family members: these are paid roles. The sudden increase in temporary jobs in January 2012 is consistent with the introduction of 23 new shops into the CVP at the time of an expansion in the caseload.



Table 14: jobs created in CVP shops

month Jun 11

Jul 11

Aug 11

Sep 11

Oct 11

Nov 11

Dec 11

Jan 12

Feb 12

Mar 12

Apr 12

May 12 total

permanent 12 16 21 20 22 5 2 3 3 0 0 0 104

temporary 1 2 0 2 0 0 0 35 21 13 14 13 101

Jobs have also been created elsewhere, especially in the dairy processing sector and probably in dairy farming and distribution. However, these seem to have been mainly an expansion of existing family capacity rather than new paid roles for people outside the family.

What additional products should be on the CVP menu?

The CVP programme includes locally made produce wherever possible and promotes the development of food processing in the Gaza strip. Various commodities have been considered and rejected in the past for a range of reasons including quality control and low confidence in the source of the inputs. This review presents an opportunity to consider them again.

Tomato paste, salsa

Many beneficiaries have requested that tomato salsa be added to the list of items: it is a widely used and healthy commodity. It is locally produced but there have been issues with the local canning company that have prevented its inclusion. There is a case for adding imported salsa to the list, and using this as leverage to solve the local issues.

Fresh Milk

Fresh milk is on the list of approved items but no Gaza production has yet been approved. Several of the milk producers have the equipment needed for pasteurisation: this seems like a logical extension of the existing list.

Olive Oil

Olive oil is an expensive product, which is locally made. Although households buy vegetable oil for frying, they also buy olive oil for consumption: see Table 5. However, olive oil is bought in bulk (around 5 litres at a time) and would be too expensive for most voucher recipients unless they were able to accumulate the vouchers over several weeks, as per Recommendation 11. This would support local production and provide savings to beneficiaries over shop prices.

Recommendation 16 The list of approved items for voucher redemption should be revisited and if possible expanded to meet the needs of the beneficiaries and support the broader aims of the project. Tomato paste, fresh milk and olive oil are proposed as a starting point for this review.



Managing the contingency

The 10% contingency

The project includes a 10% allocation for contingencies but it is not explicit how it would be used or indeed if it is designed to protect WFP or the beneficiaries – although the implication is that it could be used either way. In-‐kind budgets do not include such a contingency. The use of the contingency would be triggered by the need to increase the voucher value, which would be in response to a price inflation that has reduced the buying power of the voucher. At this point the actual exchange rate also becomes influential. To understand how the contingency might be used, we need to consider three variables:

The exchange rate …as WFP holds funds in USD and vouchers are denominated in NIS;

the cost of food on the local market

…which can be followed through the consumer price index;

The cost of food on the international market

…which has fluctuated quite dramatically in recent years.

The first two of these are important in considering how and when to modify the voucher value. The third is important when considering if and when to switch back to an in-‐kind approach, although other factors such as food already committed and in the pipeline may also be a factor.

Trends in exchange rates and CPI

When presented at the appropriate scales it is possible to see that CPI has tracked the exchange rate to a modest degree over the last 30 months, with the variances perhaps driven by changes in the access regime for imports and shortages of currency. In the medium term, we can expect the exchange rates to fluctuate within a range and the CPI to show a gradual trend of increase.

Figure 10: exchange rates and CPI over 30 months

In Figure 10: exchange rates and CPI over 30 months, both axes have a common zero point and are therefore comparable.



The impact of exchange rates on voucher values

Consider a situation in which WFP wishes to make a transfer of a voucher worth 100 NIS at current purchasing power, and intends to maintain the value of this voucher against fluctuations in exchange rates. At the current exchange rate in June 2012, a 100 NIS voucher would cost WFP $27.25. As the exchange rate increases, WFP needs to pay less for the 100 NIS voucher. If the rate continues to increase towards 4, the voucher will cost only $25. However, if the exchange rate fell back to its July 2011 value of 3.39, a 100 NIS voucher would cost $29.50. The following table shows the cost to WFP of a 100 NIS voucher at a range of exchange rates.

Table 15: the cost of a 100 NIS voucher

Exchange rate 3.32 3.39 3.47 3.54 3.62 3.69 3.77 3.84 3.92 3.99 Cost of 100 NIS voucher in USD 30.2 29.5 28.9 28.2 27.7 27.1 26.6 26.0 25.5 25.1

The impact of CPI on voucher values

In order to maintain the purchasing power, we need to consider the Consumer Price Index. Since our interest is specifically in food, we use the CPI for food and soft drinks. Using a reference year of 2004 (when the value of a standard food basket is set to 100), the most recent CPI value is 151.6. If the CPI increases by 10% to 166.8, we would need to increase the value of the voucher to NIS 110 to maintain the purchasing power of the beneficiaries. If it falls, we could in principle reduce the value of the voucher. However, reductions in CPI tend to be short-‐lived as the general trend is towards modest inflation, and reductions in the voucher value would be very unwelcome, so it is not proposed to reduce the value of the voucher in normal circumstances.

Modelling the combined effects

We can combine the impacts of changes in CPI and exchange rate. We expect the exchange rate to fluctuate around a norm, and for this exercise we use the 30-‐month mean value, 3.67, as a standard. We expect the CPI to gradually increase, so we use the current value (around 152) as a baseline. In the current situation, WFP sets a voucher value in NIS. As long as the value of the voucher is unchanged, the risk of inflationary costs is borne by the beneficiaries, while the risk of exchange rate fluctuation is accepted by WFP. To consider the combined impact of the two factors more easily, we need to imagine a situation where the voucher is designated in USD and paid in NIS at the current rate, and both sets of risk are effectively take by the beneficiary. We can now select a range of values of CPI and of exchange rate and calculate what impact these changes might have on the buying power of the voucher, if the USD cost of the voucher was held steady. The USD value of the voucher is fixed at 27.25, and the buying power now varies with both the exchange rate and the CPI.

Table 16: the buying power of a USD 27.25 worth of NIS voucher in a range of conditions



This table shows that at lower exchange rates and higher levels of inflation, the fixed value voucher becomes less valuable for the beneficiary, and more expensive for WFP.

Scenarios for contingency planning

Separating out the risks for WFP and the beneficiary again, we can consider six likely scenarios and identify appropriate actions in each case.

Figure 11: scenarios for contingency planning

Setting thresholds for review and for action

Two separate thresholds for action are required: one relating to a loss of buying power for beneficiaries and the other to a potential overspend for WFP. If an indicator passes a defined threshold, both indicators should be reviewed.

Considering possible thresholds for the CPI

The CPI has been more stable than exchange rates in terms of percentage change. A 5% increase in the average CPI value from its average value would raise it to 155.8, a value to which it has not yet climbed. The highest value in the 30 months of data is approximately 7% higher than the lowest value in the period. If we set the threshold at 5% above the lowest level this gives a value of 151.2. This has been exceeded during three periods, September 10, Feb and March 2011, and since January of this year. This suggests that short-‐term increases in CPI should probably be weathered, especially if there appear to be temporary triggers for them. Increases over a 3-‐4 month period should prompt an increase in the voucher value.

Considering possible thresholds for the exchange rate

A 5% reduction in the average exchange rate from the average value is 3.49. The exchange rate fell below this level for four months in the last 30, between May and August 2011.



A 10% reduction in the exchange rate is 3.3. The exchange rate has not dropped below this level in the last 30 months.

In this case a 5% threshold seems an appropriate level for a review of the situation – see the threshold lines included in Figure 10. The impact of a sustained reduction in exchange rate would be to increase the cost of the existing vouchers, and may cause an overspend and require the use of the contingency.

Recommendation 17 The Consumer Price Index (food only), and the cost of an ‘average’ basket of voucher commodities should be monitored and included in the monthly reporting, with variances from the reference (planning) value also recorded. Variances of 5% or more should trigger a review: such variances sustained over three months should trigger a revision in voucher value.

The combined impact

Over the last 30 months the actual changes in these indicators have each stayed within a +/-‐ 5% range. This suggests that the project should be able to manage a simultaneous decrease in exchange rates by 5% and an increase in CPI by 5% which generates a parallel increase in the voucher value – a net effect of 10.3%. Unless the changes take place at the very start of the year, the effective contingency (in terms of the amount of fluctuation the project can absorb) will increase with each passing month.

Recommendation 18 The contingency budget should be maintained at its current level for the next iteration of the planning cycle. If it has not been used during this time it can be reduced to 5% and then subsequently removed from the budget.

What happens when in-kind prices change?

It is worth making a comparison between the relative stability of prices in the Gaza Strip and the high levels of volatility in world food prices. For the same period (from Jan 2010 until now) the FAO’s Cereals Price Index has fluctuated from a low of 113.8 in June 2010 to a high of 179.6 in April 2011. The current value (May 2012) of 147.7 is close to the average over the period of 151.8. This represents a high value 18% above the average and a low value 25% below – a very wide range by comparison. Thus the appropriate response to local inflationary pressures on the voucher beneficiaries (above the level the contingency can manage) may not be an automatic switch to an in-‐kind modality, especially if local prices have risen in response to changes in global food prices.

Process map for decision making

The following process is proposed. During the budgeting cycle, use an anticipated exchange rate and CPI for initial calculations of the value. Maintain these values as the reference point for monitoring. Monitor exchange rates on a monthly basis and calculate variances in voucher cost to WFP. Add or subtract these from the overall contingency.

If exchange rates fall below planning rates by 5%, undertake scenario planning against both indicators and costing for the remainder of the year.



Monitor CPI on a monthly basis. If CPI increases by 5% from the planning figure, undertake scenario planning for both indicators for the remainder of year If CPI remains over 5% for 2 months, cross check with real time data in the marketplace. If the prediction is for a third month of elevated CPI, increase the value of the voucher. If the situation is less clear, wait for a third elevated CPI before raising the value. Note that the change must be sufficient that the lowest denominated voucher increases by at least 1 NIS.



Recommendations

1 The regular shop monitoring should include the shopkeeper’s estimation of the CVP spend as a proportion of total shop turnover, and other more specific indicators should also be explored.

2 The CVP paper-‐based monitoring system at the shop level should be reduced from a system of control to a system of validation, and payments to shops be made purely on the basis of the electronic system.

3 The depth, nature and frequency of household monitoring for the CVP and the in-‐kind distributions should be equivalent. Questions about the use of the food obtained, and the impact on other aspects of household economy should appear in both forms in the same format.

4 Cash voucher transfer values should be denominated according to actual household size rather than being clustered into groups.

5 The voucher top-‐up should be done on a calendar week, every week on a Sunday, changing the total annual number of top-‐ups from 48 to 52, and revising the voucher amount accordingly. This means that some calendar months will include 5 top-‐up days.

6 The redemption value of the cash voucher should be 11 NIS per person per calendar week. See note below

7 In order to have a better understanding of the caseload and support in the identification of errors of allocation, develop a detailed profile of the target groups, disaggregated by household size and consumption gap, based on existing data and supported by targeted field research.

8 Assistance for the very poorest needs to reflect their greater consumption gap, and should seek to close the gap by around the same degree as the standard assistance, to free up household finances for other essentials. The value of the assistance should be twice the value of the standard assistance: 22 NIS per person per calendar week.

9 Option A. The combined voucher for the beneficiaries with the largest consumption gap should have two parts. The wheat flour component should be of the same size as the in-‐kind distribution. The voucher component should be 6.5 NIS per capita per week. See note below

10 Option B -‐ preferred. The value of the enhanced voucher should be 14 NIS per capita per week. Fortified wheat flour from WFP millers is placed on the list of items for which the voucher can be exchanged, at 25kg and 50kg sizes. The flour is not a compulsory item. See note below

11 In order to allow the economical purchase of wheat flour in bulk, the voucher management arrangements be altered to allow the voucher to accumulate through one calendar month. By the end of the month the entire voucher must be redeemed. Beneficiaries could be sent an SMS with their balance periodically.

12 WFP should work towards harmonisation of the PMT between refugee and non-‐refugee populations, and the development of separate indicators and weightings for Gaza and the West Bank.

13 The training provided to all data collectors should be reviewed to ensure that assets are only recorded if (a) they are functional and (b) they are owned by the actual household under assessment and not shared within the family while being owned by another household.



14 The PMTF form should include a question at the end in which the enumerator is asked their opinion as to which category the household belongs. Discrepancy between this and the calculated result should be a trigger for review.

15 When it is required, the PMTF score validation review process should be undertaken jointly by WFP and Ma’an senior field officers to spread the responsibility. A standard format for measuring household economy will be used, ideally in a portable electronic format that allows for immediate cross-‐referencing of the various components.

16 The list of approved items for voucher redemption should be revisited and if possible expanded to meet the needs of the beneficiaries and support the broader aims of the project. Tomato paste, fresh milk and olive oil are proposed as a starting point for this review.

17 The Consumer Price Index (food only), and the cost of an ‘average’ basket of voucher commodities should be monitored and included in the monthly reporting, with variances from the reference (planning) value also recorded. Variances of 5% or more should trigger a review: such variances sustained over three months should trigger a revision in voucher value.

18 The contingency budget should be maintained at its current level for the next iteration of the planning cycle. If it has not been used during this time it can be reduced to 5% and then subsequently removed from the budget.

NOTE The recommended voucher transfer values in recommendations 6, 9 and 10 relate to a top-‐up undertaken each on a seven-‐day cycle each calendar week, as per recommendation 5. If the top-‐up is undertaken four times a month, the amount will need to be adjusted upwards proportionally.



Annex 1: Terms of Reference

Review of the Voucher assistance as a safety net transfer modality in the Gaza Strip

(Follow up of the Voucher Mid-‐term review carried out in February 2011)

Version 8 June 2012

Background

Since 2007, when WFP formally introduced the use of cash and vouchers as alternative transfer modalities in its food assistance programmes, there has been a rapid increase in the number of cash and voucher based interventions. As WFP gains greater exposure to cash and voucher based interventions a number of issues around the relative impact and cost efficiency / effectiveness of cash and vouchers, as compared to in-‐kind food, have arisen. Whereas cost efficiency refers to an evaluation of alternatives in which comparisons of costs and benefits are measured only in monetary terms, cost effectiveness is seen as a comparison of all costs and benefits, not all of which can be measured in monetary terms, and where cost efficiency is one key element. The appropriateness of using different transfer modalities in terms of meeting programme objectives should depend largely on their relative cost effectiveness and a comparison of all the main costs and benefits relevant to each intervention. Moreover, recognising the exceptional political environment of oPt, donors restrictions, and the measures imposed by the occupying power on restriction of movement, imports, and access to livelihoods, the specific local context will be taken into account in the review of the transfer modalities.

WFP Emergency Operation in the Gaza Strip

WFP is implementing an emergency operation in the Gaza Strip. The Gaza EMOP 200298 started in January 2012 for one year. A budget revision is being prepared to extend it until December 2013. The EMOP 200298 aims to support the Palestinian Authority’s social safety net with tools aimed at predicting and reducing hunger; support government capacity at the technical level to ensure successful implementation of the activities; and promote the Palestinian economy through the support to the local production and prioritization of local purchases where cost-‐effective. The EMOP includes the following components: -‐ General food distribution (GFD) targeting 200,000 food-‐insecure people in partnership with

MoSA and with the international NGO Cooperative Housing Foundation International. -‐ School feeding as an emergency safety net for 80,000 schoolchildren in public basic schools

managed by MoEHE. -‐ Cash-‐voucher transfers for 30,000 food-‐insecure people in partnership with Oxfam GB -‐ Provision of food rations to 7,000 individuals in orphanages and other special care institutions in

partnership with Ministry of Social Affairs (MoSA). -‐ Technical capacity development activities, including food security assessments, school health and

nutrition policy formulation, support to the social safety net reform process, and local purchases.

As recommended by the Gaza Voucher project Mid-‐term review conducted in February 2011, the shift from in-‐kind food to voucher assistance is gradual. The Gaza Voucher project Mid-‐term review also included a recommendation to provide a combined intervention of the UVP voucher and in-‐kind food aid or UVP Voucher and unconditional cash transfer for certain groups of beneficiaries. In-‐kind food assistance and voucher beneficiaries are selected through the proxy means test formula (PMTF), which takes into consideration vulnerability factors (household employment patterns, household size, availability of assets, household members with special needs, household indebtedness etc.), and determines the depth of the consumption gap for each household. WFP is targeting those households with the biggest consumption gap i.e. below the deep poverty line, taking into consideration the Palestinian national poverty lines. The food consumption score (FCS) allows to



determine the quality of the diet among the beneficiaries selected through the PMTF approach, and consequently their eligibility for the voucher activity. Households with a “poor” or “borderline” FCS are given priority for the voucher modality. WFP will continue its gradual shift from in-‐kind food assistance to voucher between 2012 and 2013. WFP is also planning to introduce a combined transfer modality composed of in-‐kind food commodities and voucher from January 2013; this modality aims to address two concerns: i) access to wheat flour and ii) dietary diversity. The present mission was planned by WFP and Oxfam GB as a follow up to the mid-‐term review.

Oxfam GB partnership with WFP and Food Security and Livelihoods Operations in the Gaza Strip

Oxfam GB has been working with WFP since early 2009, following the Gaza War, initially carrying out emergency in kind general food distribution and, since October 2009, Oxfam GB has been implementing the Urban Voucher Project (UVP), initially as a pilot project. The pilot UVP involved distribution of cash vouchers (for food commodities) as a substitution for in-‐kind food distributions for some of the targeted beneficiaries (2,335 households, approximately 15,000 beneficiaries), which have enabled them to access food directly from small and medium-‐sized traders in Gaza. In addition to improving the food security of the targeted households, cash vouchers are expected to provide an opportunity to make an investment in local communities, stimulating economic activity and employment at the micro level, promoting the trade of related businesses such as bakeries, farmers for eggs, and dairy factories. Following the success of the pilot project, the UVP is now an integral part of WFP programming in Gaza with the cash voucher now provided as an electronic swipe card, ‘Sahtein’3. The project has also scaled up in early 2012 with around 30,000 beneficiaries and an updated name, Cash Voucher Project (CVP). In parallel to the UVP/CVP programme, CHF is WFPs implementing partner for general food distributions, which in 2012 is serving 125,000 people. In addition to the CVP project, Oxfam GB has been implementing a range of activities to address the chronic food insecurity situation for different groups of beneficiaries in Gaza including:

• Short-‐term employment opportunities through Cash for Work with the provision of 50 days of employment (GBP10/12.70 per day) for both women and men in a range of ‘public’ service activities including, for example, sewing workshops, cooking meals for kindergartens, maintenance of public communal areas and cleaning of storm water drainage channels.

• Short-‐term un-‐conditional cash transfers provided to the ‘most vulnerable’ people who don’t have family members who are able to work with the provision of 6 monthly instalments of 250ILS (GBP 42) per month.

• Income generation opportunities for the households to increase their income but also to directly improve their intake of protein / vegetables through direct consumption including animal production units (broilers, egg-‐laying hens, rabbits, sheep) and Backyard and Rooftop Gardens including provision of inputs and training in vegetable production and marketing of the end product.

• Income generation opportunities linked to provision of small scale cash grants for development of a business idea with training provided on business skills including business plan development, sales, marketing, financial management etc.

Purpose and Objective of the mission

The mission should: i) review the current voucher project as a safety net transfer modality implemented by WFP in

partnership with OXFAM GB, in comparison of other safety net transfer modalities such as in-‐kind food assistance implemented by WFP in partnership with CHF and MoSA, or combined voucher/in-‐kind modality (not implemented yet);

ii) assess how they are meeting project objectives; iii) propose short-‐ and medium/long-‐terms improvements in terms of project objectives and

operational modalities. 3 Loosely translated as ‘enjoy your meal’.



Methodology

In order to answer the key analytical questions listed below the following methodological steps are suggested:

i) Review of the Gaza Voucher project mid-‐term review carried out in February 2011; ii) Review of secondary data, published guidance, reports on oPt safety net studies and reports,

etc.; iii) Review monitoring and evaluation information, baseline data, case studies, financial

reporting (projected and realized), food security analysis (including Food Consumption Scores and Food Security Surveys) for in-‐kind food assistance and voucher assistance beneficiaries;

iv) Collect and analyse primary data where necessary. It is envisioned that some additional focus group analysis may be necessary with beneficiaries as well as meetings with key informants involved in safety net programmes;

v) The methodology and analysis should take gender and protection into consideration.

Main questions to be addressed by the mission

Targeting Targeting complaints mechanisms:

• How to deal with inclusion/exclusion errors due to the PMTF formula itself (i.e. not those due to the data collection/data entry errors)? Review the verification/complaint mechanism currently tested.

• Human override on PMTF: Possible role of social workers/field staff in overriding the PMTF findings for inclusion/exclusion? Use of additional set of questions to be raised by Social Workers (FCS/CSI/Key productive asset questions?) to complement the PMTF, potential other criteria?

Safety net transfer modalities and transfer values Currently, WFP aims to assist all the non-‐refugee people living below the Deep Poverty Line through in-‐kind food assistance or voucher assistance implemented in partnership with MoSA (in-‐kind food assistance), CHF (in-‐kind food assistance) and Oxfam GB (voucher assistance).

• Define the pros and cons for the different transfer modalities, taking into account the scale of the required assistance and the Gaza context, and determine the rationale for the preferred option (which could include several transfer modalities).

• Review and refine the criteria aiming to select the right safety net food assistance modality for the people living below the deep poverty line i.e. in-‐kind food assistance or voucher assistance or combined in-‐kind/voucher assistance. Must consider i) food consumption score, ii) access to main staple food commodity i.e. wheat flour, iii) consumption gap, iv) size of family unit using the transfer, v) etc.

• Currently the value transfer provided through WFP in-‐kind food or voucher assistances in Gaza is the same for all the people living below the deep poverty line, whatever their respective poverty gap. The voucher value and the value of the in-‐kind food ration on the local market are equivalent i.e. the voucher and in-‐kind ration have the same transfer value. Moreover, household size is understood as nuclear family size, whatever number of extended family members that use the transfer.

• Based on the criteria established for the different transfer modalities, which transfer values should be planned by transfer modality? Do we recommend two different transfer values below the Deep poverty line depending of the consumption gap and size of family unit using the transfer, compared to another line to be established below the Deep poverty line? Stratification of those below the deep poverty line could support a better profiling of those assisted and the type of assistance needed.

• Explore the Household size categories in particular Cat#1 (HH of 1-‐2 members) and #4 (HH with 9 members and above) and scope out potential to move from HH category size to actual family size for the Voucher ration. Needs to consider the fairness against in-‐kind food



assistance (i.e. packaging and other distribution constraints require that HH size categories be applied for in-‐kind assistance) and what implications it would have.

• For Voucher rations, the frequency of top-‐up could be adjusted in certain cases e.g. validity for one month instead of one week. Seek the implication of such modification in terms of the goods that would be selected at HH level.

Means of evaluation/research: Data to use includes PMTF, Food Consumption Score (FCS), Coping Strategy Index (CSI), raw data from the Socio-‐Economic and Food Security Survey (i.e. type of livelihood; family structure), gender considerations, protection considerations, etc., and explore combinations and cross-‐tabulation. Market inflation Currently in the Voucher budget WFP has a buffer for 10% inflation, what do we do if the inflation is above 10%? Rationale for this threshold or another one? Define thresholds against existing trends which would compromise the value of the voucher or the modality of assistance (i.e. back to in-‐kind food assistance). This question could be addressed through a flow chart of action. Social Dynamics Further explore the social impact of the voucher assistance and positive or negative effects on beneficiary dignity and choice and household dynamics, including domestic violence. Areas of further analysis to be flagged with potential future drafting of 2 Terms of References: WFP protection piece and a broader FS piece, under a separate agreement.

Specific Outputs

• A progress update to WFP and Oxfam GB teams after the first week of the mission.

• A debriefing presentation to WFP and Oxfam GB senior management in Jerusalem before departure, organised by WFP, possibly including some other partners by invitation (e.g. CHF, etc.).

• An advanced draft report should be submitted within two weeks after the mission departure from oPt. The structure of the report will be discussed and finalised during the course of the mission. Recommendations for future programme design should be practical and take into account the existing constraints. The final report will be finalised within one week after receiving the consolidated comments.

Location of Assignment

The mission will be based in Gaza/oPt with a debriefing session in Jerusalem. The consultant will be hosted by Oxfam GB and fall under the administrative rules and security protocol of Oxfam GB.

Dates and Duration of the assignment

The mission should take place in June 2012 at the latest. The planned duration is 3 weeks, including 2 weeks in Gaza/oPt and 1 week to finalise the report. Total consultancy duration is 21 days including preparatory work, travel days, field work, debriefing session in Jerusalem and finalization of the report. A detailed activity schedule for the assignment in Gaza/oPt will be developed by Oxfam GB in coordination with WFP and fine tuned with the consultant upon arrival.

Composition of the mission

The mission will be composed of 1 International consultant specialised in C&V modalities, with proven experience in oPt and knowledge of the Gaza context, and with a strong safety net, relief and recovery background. The consultant will be assisted by WFP and Oxfam GB teams in oPt. The consultant will be recruited by Oxfam GB. The mission will be supervised by both WFP and Oxfam GB. The WFP focal points for the mission are Jean Noel Gentile (Head of Gaza Operations and Head of Gaza Office) and Antoine Renard (Head of Programme Support Unit); and the Oxfam GB focal points are Elena Qleibo (Deputy Food Security and Livelihoods Coordinator, Oxfam GB Gaza) and Julie Campbell (Programme Manager Oxfam GB Gaza).



Annex 2: the questions used to generate the PMTF

These questions are a subset of the questions used in the PMTF questionnaire – but the list below includes all the weighted questions. The distribution of questions between headings is by the author. Demographic questions Square value of the age of the household What is the age of the head of the household? Is the head of the household a refugee? Number of children aged 12 to 15 in the household Density of members per bedroom Number of children aged 5 or under in the household Number of adults aged 18 to 64 in the household Number of children aged 16 to 17 in the household Does the household have at least one member with disability? Number of children aged 6 to 11 in the household Is this household located in urban areas? Is this household located in West Bank? Number of elderly people aged 65 or more in the household Number of unemployed adults age 18 or more Is this a household headed by a man and that had received social assistance? Is this a household headed by a woman and that had received social assistance? Human capital questions What is the highest educational level of the head of the household: secondary? What is the highest educational level of the head of the household: elementary or preparatory or vocational diploma? What is the highest educational level of the head of the household: illiterate -‐ read or write?

Income and expenditure questions Is the household's head an employer? Does the head of the household work for foreign institutions? What is the type of Energy used for heating: wood, and other? What is the type of Energy used for heating: gas, kerosene, electricity and solar? Fixed asset questions Does the household have a solar boiler? What is the material of the walls of the household: stone? Does the household have central heating? Does it have bathroom? Household assets questions Does the household have a satellite? Does the household have a telephone line? Does the household have a computer? Does the household have a video? Does the household have a Israeli mobile? Does the household have a dryer? Productive assets questions Does the household have a private car?



Annex 3: key informants to the review process

WFP Jerusalem and Gaza Pablo Recalde WFP Country Director Tahir Nour WFP Deputy Country Director Jean-‐Noel Gentile WFP Head of Gaza Operations and Head of Gaza Office Antoine Renard WFP Head of Programme Support Unit, Jerusalem Salah Lahham WFP National Programme Officer (VAM) Ahmad Zeitawi National Finance & Admin Officer (HoU) Sahar Natsheh National Programme Officer, Urban Voucher Programme (West Bank) Mike Smeir Programme, Pipeline Officer Key Oxfam staff, Jerusalem and Gaza Sara Almer Deputy Country Director Julie Campbell Programme Manager Elena Qleibo Oxfam Deputy Food Security Coordinator Ma’an Development Centre staff Luay Alwuhaidi Programme Manager Wasem Mushtaha Programme Officer, CVP component Ma’an Field Monitors Other project stakeholders Esmee De-‐Jong Technical Expert for Food Security, ECHO Jerusalem/West Bank/Gaza Maureen Philippon ECHO Food Assistance Expert Roger Shelton ICRC Economic Security Coordinator Loek Peeters Care Damien Vaquier UNWRA Emergency Support Officer Mohammed J. Sabe CHF, WFP Programme Manager List of focus groups

• Mixed semi-‐urban group of men and women; joined CVP in January 2012 from GFD • Urban group of female beneficiaries who have been with the CVP since the start • Urban group of female beneficiaries who joined CVP in January 2012 from GFD • Urban group of male beneficiaries, mixed in terms of CVP duration • Group of Ma’an Field Monitors for CVP beneficiaries • Mixed group of very poor urban in-‐kind beneficiaries • Mixed group of very poor urban CVP beneficiaries



Annex 4: alternative HH size categories for in-kind distributions

The table below shows the actual kCal values per capita per day of the in-‐kind rations provided, assuming a complete distribution every 60 days. These numbers are generated using WFP’s NutVal tool. The category number is equivalent to the number of 50kg bags of flour provided every two months. The theoretical ration provides 92% of per capita energy needs. HH size 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Category 1 1 2 2 2 3 3 3 4 4

kCal 3710 1855 2515 1886 1509 1897 1626 1423 1705 1534

% kCal 177% 88% 120% 90% 72% 90% 77% 68% 81% 73% A single bag of flour provides exactly the WFP theoretical ration (422g per person per day) for 2 people for 2 months. Considering this fact and the distribution of household sizes (see Figure 3), the most equitable arrangement of household sizes into categories requires five categories, where the category number is again equivalent to the number of 50kg bags of wheat four provided every two months as follows:

HH size 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Category 1 1 2 2 3 3 3 4 4 5

kCal 3710 1855 2515 1886 1701 1897 1626 1558 1705 1643

% kCal 177% 88% 120% 90% 81% 90% 77% 74% 81% 78%

Highlighted cells show the household sizes where significant improvements can be made, bringing the ration closer to the theoretical level of 92% of food needs.

WFP Oxfam Gaza Cash Voucher Programme Review

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