Revised Nov 2011 JAPAN SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT FUND (JSDF) Grant Funding Proposal (FY 12– Round 35) A. BASIC DATA Beneficiary Country: Uganda Grant Name: An Innovative, Integrated Approach to Enhance Smallholder Family Nutrition Grant Recipient: BRAC Uganda Name of Implementing Agency or BRAC Uganda Agencies with Joint Implementation: Implementing Agency Type: NGO Main Sector: Health, Nutrition and Main Theme: 68 Nutrition and Agriculture Population Recipient Grant Amount: US$ 2,799,716 Bank Incremental Costs Grant Amount: US$ 200,000 Total Grant Amount US$ 2,999,716 (Recipient and Bank Incremental Costs): B. PROJECT SUMMARY This project aims to improve nutrition of an estimated 19 200 vulnerable and poorest smallholder households in Mabara and Masaka districts in Southwestern Uganda. This population has higher than average prevalence of undernutrition among children, adolescent girls, and women, including the “hidden hunger” of micronutrient deficiencies, which cost lives, diminish productivity and cause significant human capital and economic losses, and are not currently prioritized. The project will promote an innovative linkage of community-based nutrition and agricultural interventions to increase the cultivation and consumption of nutrient-rich crops among smallholder families and improve care practices of under- 2 children, adolescent girls, and women. Component 1 will finance technical support for community-level agricultural services, inputs of agricultural packages to smallholder farmers, development of systems to increase availability of nutrient-rich seeds and orange-fleshed sweet potato vine cuttings at the community level, market development for nutrient-rich crops, and use of mobile technology to transmit real-time information to farmers. Community-level health/nutrition inputs will include growth monitoring and promotion for under-2 children, nutrition forums, peer education for adolescent girls, and conditional food transfers for pregnant women to increase uptake of antenatal care. Component 2 will finance innovative financial products to encourage uptake of new products by poor farmers. Three outcome indicators will be used: (i) percentage of participating farmers adopting orange-fleshed sweet potato; (ii) percentage of infants 0-5 months exclusively breastfed; and (iii) Percentage of children 0-23 months with minimum dietary diversity. The project has been developed through a series of consultative workshops with stakeholders on the design of scalable, pro-poor interventions. These activities will be implemented by a local NGO, BRAC Uganda, with guidance from a steering committee that includes the Ugandan ministries of health and agriculture. The impact of the project will be rigorously evaluated using a randomized design, as well as action research and process documentation. These will be shared with stakeholders as part of planned workshops to share lessons learned on the potential of community-level nutrition and agricultural activities to improve nutrition among children, adolescent girls, and women smallholders. GRANT SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION 1. PROJECT INFORMATION 1.1 Strategic Context Uganda’s current National Development Plan for FY11-15 (NDP i) aims at reducing inequity, raising growth and living standards, and addressing food and nutrition security through multi-sectoral action. Uganda’s economic growth, mainly in industry, has almost halved the national poverty rate in less than 20 years (from 56.4% in 1992-93 to 24.5% in 2009- 10 ii). In marked contrast, Uganda’s progress in reducing hunger (MDG1) is poor and unacceptable, given a strong record of sustained poverty reduction. Chronic undernutrition currently stunts 38% Ugandan children under 5 years old (2.3 million). Stunting decreased only 6% between 1995 and 2006 and remains higher than in neighboring countries with lower per capita income iii,iv,v. Slow progress on improving nutrition hampers poverty reduction and all other human and economic development goals. Micronutrient deficiencies in vitamin A vi, ironvii, iodine viii and zinc among many Ugandans cost lives, diminish productivity and cause significant human capital and economic losses. Undernutrition contributes to 14% low birth weight infants, more than half of all child deaths, and thus to Uganda’s low life expectancy at birth (53 years) and ranking on U5MR (19th in the world at 128/1,000 ix). More than 1,500 women die annually of causes related to anemia, as do over 16,000 low birth weight infants and 67,000 hungry children11. Estimated annual national losses to malnutrition are 4.1% GDP x and $145 million xi GoU identifies agriculture as the primary growth sector because subsistence farming by smallholders currently accounts for 96% of all farm production, a quarter of total GDP, employs over two-third of workers, and earns over 40% of household income. Rural poverty is three times higher (27%) than urban poverty (9%), subsistence farmers suffer the highest poverty rate xii, and large regional disparities persist (poverty rate ranges between 10.7% and 46.2% for central and northern regions). The Agriculture Sector Development Strategy and Investment Plan (DSIP xiii) aims to increase rural incomes, increase livelihoods and improve household food and nutrition security. The Uganda Nutrition Action Plan, 2011-2016 (UNAP xiv) identifies specific objectives, strategies, interventions and investments needed to implement the Uganda Food and Nutrition Policy (UFNP, 2003 xv) for development goals. However, despite a strong policy environment and comprehensive plans, GoU capacity to implement NDP, DSIP and UNAP is limited by challenges of coordination, implementation and finance: weak institutional frameworks to mainstream and scale up nutrition interventions; high risks and costs of rural finance through formal banking; limited availability of improved farm inputs; inadequate production and post-harvest facilities; limited agricultural extension support; weak food chain value addition; and dependence on donor support for current nutrition programming. Needed is an opportunity to test scalable, pro-poor innovations to demonstrate the potential of community-level nutrition and agricultural activities to improve nutrition among children, adolescent girls, and women smallholders. This is particularly important for the “hidden hunger” of micronutrient deficiencies, which are widespread among these groups but not currently prioritized. 1.2 Main This project will target the poorest smallholder farmers living in the southwestern region of Uganda, Beneficiaries which is of key concern due to a large mismatch between income poverty and health outcomes: Although the poverty rate in this region is lower than the national average (18% vs 24%), women and children are more vulnerable to undernutrition: vitamin A and chronic energy deficiencies are more prevalent among adolescent girls and women, and under-five malnutrition is higher (e.g. stunting: 44% vs. 39%; anemia: 63% vs. 48%). The high level of stunting has been linked to poor infant and young child feeding practices and low dietary diversity. Rural smallholders dependent on subsistence agriculture are among the most vulnerable groups for undernutrition. Girls, women and young children in the poorest rural smallholder families suffer gender inequity, lack control of resources and decision-making and are highly vulnerable to undernutrition. Women provide the majority of agricultural labor and are also responsible for producing or acquiring food for their families; this project will make particular efforts to identify and mobilize women through all components of the intervention. At the same time, men and community leaders will be targeted for nutrition and agriculture community forums to facilitate their involvement and ensure that nutrition and health promotion efforts are not identified as only women’s responsibilities. The intended beneficiaries are the smallholder farmers in 160 villages in 2 districts in Mbarara and Masaka districts, Southwestern Region, Uganda. Community-based promoters will be selected from each village to provide training and community-based agriculture, health and nutrition activities. They will be supported by coordinators trained to provide refresher training and supportive supervision. The implementing agency (BRAC Uganda) will be responsible for ensuring the quality of service delivery. Specifically, the following groups will be targeted (with estimated number of beneficiaries for each, although there will be some overlap in agriculture and nutrition/health interventions): • Poor subsistence farmers to receive agricultural input packages and training to improve cultivation of nutrient-rich crops, and health and nutrition training to increase demand for these crops (160 villages x 120 farmers = 19 200 , estimated to be 60% women) • Children 0-24 months to be targeted for growth monitoring and promotion: (160 villages x 50 kids 0-24 months = 8000) • Adolescent girls to be targeted for peer education sessions (160 villages x 6 adolescent girls = 960) • Community-based agriculture promoters: (1 community agriculture promoter per 2 villages = 80) • Community based health promoters (160 villages x 1 community health promoter = 160) • Community-based adolescent health promoters (160 villages x 1 adolescent girl = 160) • Vine producers (1 vine producer per 4 villages = 40) • Marketing agents (1 marketing agent per 2 villages = 80) • Pregnant women to be targeted for conditional nutrient-rich food transfer (500 pregnant women in 40 villages) • Health workers with initial and refresher training on strengthened ANC (40 health workers covering 160 villages) • Smallholder farmers to receive financial products (900 farmers in 12 villages) Total beneficiaries: 34 020. To avoid double-counting, targets for financial products are not included in this total, as it is assumed that they will also receive the agricultural input packages and training Total cost per direct beneficiary = 82 USD. The percentage of JSDF grant channeled directly to beneficiaries is 73%. This includes initial and follow-up agricultural input packages to smallholder farmers (nutrient-rich seeds and orange- fleshed sweet potato (OFSP) and quarterly training to improve agricultural yields and post-harvest handling and marketing. In the same villages, social and behavior change communication strategies targeted to smallholder households will generate community demand for nutrient-rich products. This will include health and nutrition input packages to community health promoters; growth monitoring and promotion for under-2 children; and peer education with adolescent girls. The health and agricultural promoters, vine produces, and marketing agents are also considered to be direct beneficiaries as they will be selected from the participating villages and will improve local capacity. In addition, non-targeted subsistence farming households will benefit indirectly from spillover of knowledge and dissemination strategies. 1.3 Project Location The proposed project will be in four selected sites in Mbarara and Masaka districts, Southwestern Region, Uganda, covering 160 villages. 1.4 Project Duration: 36 months Project Start : 6/1/2012 Project End Date: 6/1/2015 1.5 Task Team Leader Ziauddin Hyder 1.6 GRANT DEVELOPMENT OBJECTIVE To improve nutrition of an estimated 19200 vulnerable smallholder households in Mbarara and Masaka districts, by promoting the cultivation and consumption of nutrient-rich crops and improving nutrition and care practices of under-2 children, adolescent girls, and pregnant women. 1.7 DEVELOPMENT OUTCOME INDICATORS Baseline End Target 1.7(a) Percentage of participating farmers adopting orange-fleshed sweet potato. “Adoption” means that the participating farmers 0% 20% are cultivating any orange-fleshed sweet potato at the time of the end line survey (i.e. after the project agricultural inputs are over) 1.7(b) Percentage of infants 0-5 months exclusively breastfed 10% 15% 1.7(c) Percentage of children aged 6-23 months with minimum dietary diversity. Dietary diversity is an estimate of adequate micronutrient intake: Minimum dietary diversity is foods from 4 or more food groups (based upon recall of diet in the previous day, 57% 67% using the following food groups: grains, roots and tubers; legumes and nuts; dairy products (milk, yogurt, cheese); flesh foods; eggs; vitamin-A rich fruits and vegetables; other fruits and vegetables) 2. GRANT RECIPIENT AND IMPLEMENTING AGENCY 2.1 Recipient Name: BRAC Uganda BRAC Uganda is a large NGO that is uniquely and strongly positioned to implement an innovative project linking agriculture, livelihood and nutrition that leverages opportunities and addresses constraints specific to the Ugandan context. Within 5 years, BRAC Uganda has emerged as one of the largest development organizations active in most vulnerable areas of the country. BRAC now provides micro-loans to 103,682 borrowers through its network of 130 branches in 67 districts, more than any other financial institution in the country and currently employs more than 2,000 full time staff, 95% are citizens of Uganda. BRAC Uganda microfinance branches also now train and support an extensive network of 3,502 self-employed entrepreneurs, who provide critical livelihood enhancement services to community members in agriculture, poultry, livestock, and adolescent development and health sectors. BRAC Uganda’s annual base budget for 2011 was 4.8 M and for the next four years has budgeted 19.8 M for core programs. A strong portfolio of current development projects funded by UNICEF, UNWomen, Nike Foundation, USAID, UNHCR, Living Goods, Wellspring, World Bank and ASARECA evidence BRAC Uganda’s significant implementation. BRAC Uganda is a trusted partner for achieving GoU’s Nutrition Action Plan 2011-2016 (UNAP). BRAC Uganda has established and maintained good communication with GoU’s ministries on strategies to support the national development agenda. BRAC Uganda has successfully implemented microfinance, health, agriculture, poultry and livestock, education, adolescent development programs, and many of these programs are implemented in partnership with the Government. Recognizing agriculture as a key sector for socioeconomic development and poverty reduction, BRAC Uganda has provided training to 800 community agriculture promoters (CAP), primarily women, who promote improved agricultural practices. BRAC Uganda has also trained 1200 model farmers and 75000 general farmers. It also established community led block farms for rice production; catered innovative loan product specifically targeted to small farmers and founded a seed production center to ensure the availability of quality agriculture input for smallholder farmers. BRAC Uganda’s health program provides necessary health services and products through 2,300 community health promoters (CHP), and is extending basic health care services to over 1.1 million people in the urban and rural areas of Uganda. The community-based health services include antenatal and postnatal care, family planning, identification and referral for tuberculosis patients, awareness for HIV, bed net usage to reduce malaria and some health care products. All these services are provided through strong partnership with the Government, including the local government, Ministry of Health, Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries, and other development partners. All these partners have been included in the proposed project steering committee to deliver this pilot project. 2.3 Implementing Agent Details Agency Name: BRAC Uganda Address Plot 90, Busingiri Zone, Off Entebbe Road, Nyanama, PO Box 31817, Kampala, Uganda Contact Person in Proposed Abul Kashem Mozumder, Country Representative, BRAC Uganda Implementing Agency Phone: +256(0)759214306 Email: mozumder.ak@brac.net 2.4 Implementing Agency Background (see 2.1) 2.5 Other institutions/NGOs that will be involved in implementation Further consultations are planned with local expertise (i.e. International Potato Centre (CIP), STEADMAN Group, Grameen Foundation, FHI360, and HarvestPlus) that will facilitate development of manuals and provision of initial training, mobile technology usage and other necessary technical inputs. The project will explore a partnership with a local university (Makarere Business School), which has experience in implementing evaluation research and could undertake the baseline and end line surveys. In addition, the University of Sydney has expressed interest in providing additional funding and technical support to undertake operational research and more rigorous impact evaluations of the financial product innovations. 3. INNOVATION AND SUSTAINABILITY 3.1 Innovation This proposal builds upon a series of in-country consultative workshops (Annex 1) with key policy-makers from relevant government ministries and development partners to explore options to increase awareness, adoption and consumption of nutrient-rich food crops in the country. Participants reviewed previous work in Uganda by HarvestPlus and others, which explored consumer acceptability and market development for biofortified orange-fleshed sweet potato (OFSP). Sweet potato is already an important and common crop in Uganda, although most communities consume white-fleshed sweet potatoes instead of the nutrient-rich OFSP. Rigorous evaluations have been conducted on the nutritional value of the proposed crops developed by HarvestPlus, moreover the investigations found sufficient interest amongst the farmers in adopting this technology to warrant a moderately large pilot project. The workshop also discussed the key barriers to increasing consumption of biofortified crops, including findings of a district-level survey of farmers, agriculture and health personnel. Delivering a multisectoral nutrition action was highlighted by the government and partners, including JICA as a priority to address these barriers. The intervention will implement for the first time in Uganda an integrated package of nutrition and agriculture interventions to improve diets for women, infants and young children in smallholder households through increased cultivation of nutrient-rich crops, increased dietary diversity and improved care and feeding practices. The intervention incorporates several innovations to promote the cultivation and consumption of nutrient-rich crops among these at-risk groups. Component 1: This component will promote a linked package of community-based agriculture, health, and nutrition services to mobilize smallholder farmers to cultivate and consume nutrient-rich crops. The component will finance technical support for community-level agriculture and health/nutrition, including consultants, operations manuals and training materials, training, refresher training and supportive supervision, workshops, and agriculture/nutrition fairs. In addition to training, packages of goods will be provided to smallholder farmers to start cultivating nutrient-rich crops. As this vulnerable group often cannot afford transport to larger markets where seeds/vines are available, component 1 will also support the development of systems to make nutrient-rich inputs available to smallholder farmers at the community level: community-based agriculture agents will receive packages of seeds, inorganic fertilizer, and tool and vine producers will be trained and receive initial inputs to propagate OFSP vine cuttings. Based on experiences in other countries, BRAC Uganda will work with local partners 1 to develop a low cost tissue culture laboratory to produce OFSP vine cuttings for local use. The model will be designed to be self-sustaining after two years by (i) promotion of vine cuttings to local farmers beyond the targeted smallholders and (ii) stimulating demand and supply for the smallholders through the vine promoters. The process and contributions by all partners will be carefully documented as this has potential for scale-up to address the barriers to accessing high-quality, disease free planting materials. Component 1 will also support innovative mobile information and communication technology to provide technical assistance to the targeted smallholder farmers, including real-time information on market prices of inputs and products, weather forecasts, and diagnostics and treatment of crop diseases. Community agents will be also trained on market development for nutrient-rich crops, particularly OFSP, to help stimulate production. Through component 1, incentives will be provided to community-based health/nutrition agents to provide health/nutrition forums. These agents will also receive health/nutrition packages, including scales and printed materials for growth monitoring and promotion (GMP) and materials for food demonstrations. Adolescent girls receive a small package of health/nutrition inputs and will be trained to provide support for community-based health and nutrition activities, and to provide peer-education for health and nutrition. In a subsample of villages, pregnant mothers in vulnerable households will be offered nutrient rich food transfers (equivalent to 25 USD) conditional upon uptake of antenatal care (ANC) at least 4 times. This innovation will focus on directly improving the nutritional status of pregnant women as well as creating demand for the new crop. In the subsample of villages with conditional food transfers, program assistants will provide initial and refresher training to health workers at health clinics to promote nutrient-rich foods and address supply-side constraints to the quality of ANC service delivery. Health workers will also receive initial input packages of health and nutrition commodities for demonstration purposes. Together, these agriculture and health/nutrition interventions will promote and support both production (supply) and consumption (demand) of nutrient-rich food crops. The design of the project has incorporated considerations of gender: the role of women is important as they are often “gatekeepers” of nutrition through their roles in producing and/or procuring food for their families. Female caregivers of under-2 children will be targeted through GMP sessions. However, as women are not usually major decision-makers in the household, husbands, older women, and community leaders will be also targeted through community forums and fairs on agriculture, health and nutrition. It is expected that the beneficiaries of agricultural inputs to smallholder farmers will be about 60% female. Component 2: Previous work has identified financial barriers to adopting new varieties of food crops, particularly concerns about the unpredictability of the demand for the crop in the market (especially for new food crops that are not widely consumed), and lack of capital to invest in new inputs, as existing microcredit schemes are not suited to agriculture. Evaluation of these pilots will allow identification of which financial products are effective and can be feasibly scaled-up, and improve knowledge of the constraints faced by the smallholders in adopting or increasing production of nutrient-rich crops. The three financial credit products are: • A credit product for cereal crops customized to improve pre- and post-harvest cash flow for agriculture inputs. • A voucher scheme for agriculture inputs (seeds and fertilizers) available right after the harvest when farmers have cash in hand. These inputs are then delivered to customers when they are needed at the next cropping season. • Price insurance for the first cropping season. The project will test whether short-term price insurance can have long- term, positive effects on technology adoption and the benefits accrued. 1 Partnerships will be sought with local agricultural colleges and the National Agricultural Research Organization (NARO), the lead for guidance and coordination of agricultural research in Uganda. 3.2 Sustainability The project concept was developed based on a series of in-country consultations and is completely aligned with UNAP and NDP. The innovations are low-tech, affordable, and feasible because of local availability of materials and inputs. A sample of 180 farmers in three districts indicated all families currently eat sweet potato at least once a week, 30% eat them daily, and more than 80% of sweet potato consumed are grown in the household. Therefore, with support from CAP and CHP there is high probability that OFSP and other nutrient-rich crops promoted through intervention will enter target beneficiary diets as well as being sold for profit. All the interventions require strong community participation and ownership to increase demand for OFSP and other nutrient rich crops. The project will support a transition to a social entrepreneurial method of delivering the agricultural services to the target population. After two years, external support (input packages and incentives) will be phased out, but technical assistance will still be provided to support community-based service delivery for agriculture with small income generation from marginal profits from services rendered, such as earning profit from input deliveries of seeds or vines to the community. For the marketing agents, linking smallholder farmers to traders or transport will provide marginal profits that they can keep as incentives. For health/nutrition services, the inputs are intended to generate demand for OFSP and nutrient rich products and to link this demand to improved care and nutrition practices; these AHPs and CHPs are not intended to be self-sustaining, rather to demonstrate the viability of this voluntary cadre with small incentives and regular training inputs. 4. CONSULTATION WITH JAPANESE DEVELOPMENT PARTNERS 4.1 Name of Mr. Yusuke Haneishi, JICA Expert, Ministry of Date of Meeting 4/10/2011 Representative Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries 4.2 Summary of Consultation: JICA had a strong representation during the national consultation as stated in section 3.1. In addition, a BRAC Uganda team met Mr. Yusuke Haneishi and his colleagues two times. During these meetings, information was exchanged on the potential relevance of rice promotion and animal husbandry programs in Uganda currently funded by the Japanese Government. Key discussion points were: the importance of alignment of all project goals with national policy documents; partnership with NARO for nutrient rich crop production; the need to strengthen the evidence base on orange fleshed sweet potato and high iron beans as attractive crops to farmers, food commodity for consumers and effective vehicle for increased consumption of vitamin A precursors and iron; and the critical need for significant technical inputs to support nutrient rich crop promotion and support by organizations with little prior specific experience with the approach. It was agreed that BRAC Uganda would closely collaborate with JICA in the implementation and supervision of the proposed JSDF funded project. Furthermore, the proposed pilot project ideas were informally shared with Eiji Wakamatsu, the Adviser to the Executive Director of Japan to the World Bank. He expressed his strong support. 4.3 Potential Collaboration: See above. 4.4 Name of Mr. Ryo Tokunaga, Head of Economic Cooperation Date of Meeting 25/10/2011 Representative Section, Japan Embassy, Uganda 4.5 Summary of Consultation: During the meeting the ideas regarding the concept note were shared. He appreciated the efforts to develop this pilot project without any specific comments on the content because Japanese Embassy has no direct linkage with the proposed project content or implementation. He appreciated BRAC’s efforts to communicate with JICA and suggested to keep JICA engaged in the project implementation and supervision. 4.6 Potential Collaboration Japan Embassy was informed about our present collaboration with Rice Secretariat, MAAIF in Uganda National Rice Development Strategy (NRDS) being an implementing partner for increasing rice production. 5. JAPANESE VISIBILITY 5.1 Confirm that a grant signing ceremony will take place in the recipient country, including Agreed representatives from the Embassy of Japan, and that a press release would be issued in local newspapers 5.2 Confirm that the Embassy of Japan in the recipient country will be invited to participate in field Agreed visits and project events, and will receive copies of progress review mission reports 5.3 Describe the measures, other than the above, to be taken to ensure the visibility of Japan’s contribution : All media, materials, and supplies used in project delivery, training and dissemination will be marked with icons and phrases indicating the main donors and designed through a local competition in schools attended by children of poor farmers. 6. DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF GRANT COMPONENTS 6.1 Component 1: Community-based agriculture and health service delivery to promote cultivation $ 2,215,016 and consumption of nutrient-rich crops This component will support the piloting of an innovative package of linked community-based agriculture, health, and nutrition interventions to improve the cultivation and consumption of nutrient-rich foods among smallholder farmers. Community-based agriculture services will aim to support smallholder farmers to cultivate nutrient-rich crops, particularly OFSP. Iron rich beans, carrot, cabbage, tomato, and groundnuts will also be promoted. The specific activities include: a) Before each planting season, community agriculture promoters (CAPs) will provide training for smallholder farmers on good agricultural practices as well as training on adopting nutrient-rich crops. After the training, smallholder farmers will receive packages of improved planting materials (high-quality OFSP vines and other nutrient-rich seeds). These packages will be provided for two seasons. In the third season, a system will be developed to make nutrient-rich seeds and OFSP vines available for purchase through community agriculture promoters (see below, b) and vine producers (see below, c). Technical assistance to increase knowledge on improved farming practices will continue throughout the 3 year project through community forums (i.e. improving yields, making and using organic fertilizer, minimizing post-harvest losses); b) Providing packages of agricultural inputs (tools, seeds, inorganic fertilizer) to CAPs to set up demonstration sites for community forums and to facilitate smallholder farmer access to nutrient-rich seeds at the community level to meet the demand that this project is expected to generate; c) Establishing a system to cultivate and distribute high-quality OFSP vine cuttings to smallholder farmers through community-based vine producers: Through partnership with local universities, a local low-cost tissue culture lab will be developed to establish a local source for vine cuttings. These will be used to establish propagation sites that will be maintained by local vine producers who will then provide the cuttings to local smallholder farmers as part of the input packages described above. This subcomponent will include a communications and promotion strategy to build demand for the vine cuttings among other members of the community, to build a sustainable market for high quality vine cuttings. It is planned that this low cost tissue lab will continue without external support after two years; this is based on BRAC’s experience in Bangladesh and elsewhere. A gradual exit strategy is planned in which the community- based vine producers will produce and sell vine cuttings without financial inputs after 2 years, keeping marginal profits as incentives. In the third year of the project, the vine producers will not receive any inputs but will continue to receive technical assistance from the program assistants; d) Introducing innovative mobile information and communication technology (ICT) to provide technical assistance to farmers through the CAPs (i.e. real-time market prices, weather data, support for diagnosis and treatment of crop diseases); e) Training community-based marketing agents to provide technical and operational assistance in market development to increase sales and profits from nutrient-rich produce (i.e. post-harvest handling, improved access to transportation of crops to larger markets); f) Annual sensitization workshops will be held with agriculture stakeholders in each branch to build capacity, identify barriers, and share lessons learned. To increase community demand and consumption of these newly introduced crops, a cadre of Community Health Promoters (CHPs) and Adolescent Health Promoters (AHPs) will be trained and supported/supervised by the implementation partner (BRAC) to mobilize the community for health/nutrition activities and promote consumption of nutrient-rich foods. CAPs and CHPs will receive initial health and nutrition input packages and will be offered performance- based incentives for their work. They will receive regular refresher training and supportive supervision to ensure quality of service delivery. Specific activities will include: a) Introducing monthly growth monitoring and promotion (GMP) sessions for under-2 children to build caregiver knowledge of and demand for nutrient-rich crops (i.e. through promoting dietary diversity and optimal infant/young child feeding practices, providing food demonstrations); b) Initiating quarterly health/nutrition community forums targeting female caregivers, husbands, and elders to promote nutrient-rich foods and improved nutrition practices for under-2 children, adolescent girls, and pregnant women; c) Engaging adolescent girls in health and nutrition activities: CHPs will identify, mobilize and supervise adolescent girls in each community to hold peer education sessions on nutrition and health. AHPs will also assist with GMP sessions and quarterly health and nutrition forums, and will be eligible to earn performance-based incentives for their work; d) Nutrient-rich food transfer for pregnant women, conditional on 4 antenatal care (ANC) visits, will be tested in 40 villages: CHPs will provide the community with information on the health values of both ANC, refer women to ANC, and build knowledge about nutrient-rich crops. Uptake of ANC services will be incentivized with food transfers designed to increase nutrient-rich food use. Vouchers for food transfers equivalent to USD 25 will be provided to eligible low-income pregnant women. Eligibility will be determined using criteria already developed by BRAC to identify low-income families; marketing agents will purchase the food from local sources and distribute to pregnant women. It is expected that this activity will improve the utilization of ANC among participants. Supply-side barriers to ANC quality will be addressed through initial input packages, training, refresher training, and supportive supervision with health workers, as well as annual sensitization workshops with district health officials (see (f), below); e) Annual agriculture and nutrition fairs to promote nutrient-rich foods: to build community awareness and demand for these underutilized foods, producer fairs will demonstrate food preparation and processing techniques. f) Annual sensitization workshops will be held with health/nutrition stakeholders in each branch to build capacity, identify barriers, and share lessons learned. Technical assistance from local and international experts will be used to develop appropriate training materials and operation manuals for community-based workers, building upon previous experiences promoting nutrient-rich crops in Uganda and other countries. This technical assistance, in collaboration with BRAC Uganda’s Training Division, will be used to train consultants (2 Capacity-Building Consultants, 1 Capacity-Building Manager) as trainer of trainers (TOTs). These consultants will train 16 program assistants (4 per branch) and the community-based promoters and health workers. A system of supportive supervision and regular refresher trainings by program assistants, capacity-building coordinators, and the capacity building manager, as well as technical support and monitoring by BRAC Uganda, will ensure high quality of training of the smallholder farmers. Outputs: • 40 community members trained as Vine Producers; 80 support packages distributed to vine producers over two seasons • Two packages of training and high-nutrient seed and vine inputs distributed to 19200 smallholder farmers over two seasons • 80 community members trained as Community Agriculture Promoters (CAPs); 160 support packages for two seasons (nutrient-rich seeds, tools, inorganic fertilizer) to CAPs; Annual agriculture/nutrition fairs to build community knowledge • Provision of mobile phones and ICT based messages to 160 CAPs to provide real-time agriculture information to community • 80 community members trained as marketing agents • 160 community members trained as Community Health Promoters (CHPs); 160 input packages to CHPs; 8000 under-2 children covered by monthly GMP sessions (50 per village per year); 160 Adolescent Health Promoters (AHPs) trained on GMP and nutrition; 160 input packages to AHPs; 960 adolescent girls enrolled in peer-education sessions • 160 Health Workers trained on strengthened ANC (including nutrition) • 500 pregnant women enrolled in conditional transfer of nutrient-rich foods • 16 Program Assistants trained as trainers, and on supervision and support; 2 Capacity-Building Coordinators trained on technical aspects of Agriculture, Nutrition and Health • Annual sensitization meetings to build district capacity 6.2 Component 2: Introduction of innovative financial products to promote cultivation of $ 94,500 nutrient-rich foods This component will support 3 financial credit products: • A credit product for cereal crops customized to improve pre- and post-harvest cash flow for agriculture inputs that poor farmers need. BRAC Uganda agriculture program has already tested this credit product. It has a monthly repayment structure with flat interest rate where poor farmers get 8 months and the total payable amount, 25.8% are to be paid during the first four months at equal monthly installment and the rest 74.2% to be paid in equal monthly installment in the last four months. • A voucher scheme that enables poor farmers to make better use of their income. Due to lack of savings services and a reluctance to commit cash to inputs that will not be used immediately, farmers often spend their income from harvest relatively soon after the harvesting time. This puts them into a financial constraint whereby they do not have adequate cash to buy inputs in the next cropping season. To solve these problems, the farmers will be offered vouchers for agriculture inputs (seeds and fertilizers) to buy right after their harvest. These inputs are then delivered to customers when they are needed at the next cropping season. • Price insurance for the first cropping season. The project will test whether short-term price insurance can have long- term, positive effects on technology adoption and the benefits accrued. (A summary of BRAC Uganda’s previous experience with these products is included in Annex 2) • 300 farmers enrolled in credit product • 300 farmers enrolled in voucher scheme Outputs: • 300 farmers enrolled in price insurance 6.3 Component 3: Monitoring and Evaluation and Knowledge Dissemination $ 258,000 Monitoring and Evaluation (M and E): Consultants hired and supervised through BRAC Uganda’s Monitoring Division (MD), Training Division (TD) and independent Research and Evaluation Division (RED) will ensure quality in program implementation, process documentation and knowledge capture. MD will conduct quarterly monitoring focusing on identified indicators, in close collaboration with the project management team and suggest changes in delivery in an ongoing basis. RED will conduct overall and experimental components impact evaluation using randomized techniques, action research and process documentation of the project. Process evaluation will examine qualitative indicators and intermediate measures of delivery and uptake including: agriculture productivity and income, nutrient-rich food crop cultivation, awareness and demand for nutrient-rich food, and improved child and maternal care and feeding practices. Consultants will be hired for semi-annual monitoring trips to each branch. Total percentage of JSDF grant on M and E: 8 % A project steering committee comprised of representatives of ministries of Agriculture and Health, experts in nutrition and agriculture, and researchers will oversee project design and implementation and ensure sound documentation and dissemination of lessons learned (see Annex 3 for members). A national workshop will be held before the project starts to consult stakeholders on project design; a follow-up workshop will be held at the end of the project to share lessons learned and look for ways forward. Outputs: • Overall implementation report of lessons learned • Semi-annual monitoring reports • Impact evaluation of the overall project and experimental component • National workshops held with stakeholders before and after the project 6.4 Component 4: Project Management and Administration $ 232,200 The Program Manager of BRAC Uganda’s Agriculture program will coordinate with the Program Manager of BRAC-Uganda Health Program and will be responsible for overall project implementation. In addition to TOT, supportive supervision, and refresher training, the capacity building manager and capacity building coordinator will be trained on project management. The management trainings will be conducted by BRAC’s agriculture and health program trainers at BRAC’s residential training facility in Kampala. BRAC UGANDA would maintain separate accounts for the JSDF project expenditures to facilitate independent external annual audits, contracted in accordance to Terms of Reference acceptable to the Bank. Outputs: • Annual Independent External Audit reports • Implementation Completion Report by BRAC Uganda as Implementing Agency 7. ELIGIBLE EXPENDITURES List all applicable eligible expenditures below in one or more categories as necessary. Eligible expenditures include consultant services (including audits), local training and workshops, small civil works, goods, sub-grants, and Bank incremental costs. Category Amount (US Dollars) Percentage of Percentage of Expenditures to Grant Total be Financed Goods $ 1,076,216 100% 38% Consultant Services $ 307,200 100% 11% Training $ 1,016,400 100% 36% Operating Costs $ 153,000 100% 5% Works n/a n/a Other – financial products $ 94,500 100% 3% Other – Service delivery incentives $ 22,400 100% 1% Other - Sub-awards $ 130,000 100% 5% Total Grant to Recipient $ 2,799,716 93% Bank Incremental Costs $ 200,000 7% Total Grant Amount: $ 2,999,716 100% OPERATIONAL RISKS ASSESSMENT FRAMEWORK Risk Category Risk Rating Risk Description Proposed Mitigation Project Low Poor farmers lack interest Communities will be actively engaged. Training, refresher Beneficiaries and capacity to adopt new training and supportive supervision of community-based and technology cadres will be used to help communities address the barriers Stakeholders they face in adopting the new crop. Financial products will be Risks offered to a subset to mitigate the financial risk to poor smallholders. Implementing Medium-L There might be conflict BRAC Uganda will ensure active involvement of the steering Agency Risks and disagreement committee and its capacity will be strengthened by the between local actors over involvement of the agriculture and health ministry by regular the implementation consultation during project implementation (see Annex 3, strategy of the project steering committee). Project Risks: Design Medium-I Challenging governance Support to strengthen governance. environment Elite capture Transparent selection and public disclosure. Lack of capacity of local Consultation and advocacy will aim at ensuring that health health centers facilities provide adequate ANC/PNC care, as well as training/refresher training with health workers and sensitization and capacity building of health managers through annual meetings. Social and Low Environmental JSDF Program Low Project not implemented This proposed project fits with the Bank and Donor priorities and Donor as planned; as well as the UNAP and has been endorsed by the Country Representative; Donor is not as visible as In addition to 6 month formal project supervision, the Health desired by JSDF Nutrition and Population Task Team Leader based in Uganda will provide periodic supervision; Visibility of the project will be stressed during project preparation phase, and ensured during supervision visits and during meetings with both government and community Delivery Quality Medium-I There is a risk of poor Strict monitoring and regular feedback to BRAC Uganda quality of service delivery conducted as a part of the service delivery process and included in M&E during project implementation. Independent monitoring and evaluation will also provide real-time feedback for making project improvement throughout the life of the project and addressing observed deficiencies in service delivery. Continuous dialogue, transparency and accountability, prioritized as cross-cutting deliverables for all project components. JSDF -- DETAILED COST TABLE DATE: May 4, 2012 PROPOSED ACTIVITY: An Innovative, Integrated Approach to Enhance Smallholder Family Nutrition COUNTRY/PROGRAM: Uganda Components & Activities Expenditure Procurement Quantity Unit Unit Rate Total Cost Category Method 1 (US$) (US$) COMPONENT 1: Community-based agriculture and health/nutrition service delivery to promote cultivation and consumption of nutrient-rich crops 1.1 Supporting cultivation of nutrient-rich crops 1.1.1 Input packages to smallholder farmers Basic farmer local shopping 38400 farmers $23 $883,200 package to promote seasons cultivation of (budget nutrient-rich crops attached) 1.1.2 Service delivery packages to community-based promoters Vine producers local shopping 80 farmers $255 $20,400 seasons (budget attached) Community local shopping 160 farmers $255 $40,800 Agriculture seasons Promoter (CAP) (budget attached) 1.1.3 Initial community training and refresher trainings Training forums 76800 number $2 $153,600 for community on improved agriculture practices CAPs incentives 1920 number $5 $9,600 for conducting training forums 1.1.4 Facilitate development of Low Cost Tissue Culture Lab to produce Orange-Flesh Sweet Potato (OFSP) vine cuttings Establishment of NCB 1 Contract $130,000 $130,000 low cost tissue culture lab 1.1.5 ICT based service delivery Android phones local shopping 179 phone sets $140 $25,060 Applications shopping 3 $5,000 $15,000 per year Data transfer shopping 6444 phone months $5 $32,220 SUBTOTAL: 1.1 $1,309,880 1.2 Community-based nutrition services 1.2.1 Service delivery packages to community health promoters Community local shopping 160 person (budget $220 $35,138 Health Promoter attached) (CHP) Adolescent local shopping 160 person (budget $25 $3,998 Health Promoter attached) (AHP) 1.2.2 Community health and nutrition forums CHPs incentives 1920 number $5 $9,600 for conducting quarterly community health/nutrition training forums Quarterly 57600 persons $2 $115,200 community health/nutrition training forums 1.2.3 Performance-based incentives for CHPs and AHPs CHP incentives 20000 incentives/child $1 $20,000 for monthly growth monitoring and promotion sessions AHPs incentives 2400 adolescent girls $1 $2,400 for monthly peer education sessions 1.2.4 Conditional transfers pilot Health worker 40 persons $75 $3,000 (HW) initial training HW refresher 80 person round $25 $2,000 training HW ANC input local shopping 40 person (budget $135 $5,400 package attached) Transfer of local shopping 600 pregnant $25 $15,000 nutrient rich food women 1.2.5 Annual agriculture/nutrition fairs Annual 12 number $5,000 $60,000 agriculture/nutriti on fairs to promote vine cuttings SUBTOTAL: 1.2 $271,736 1.3 Capacity building for community-based service delivery 1.3.1 Sensitization of local stakeholders Annual local shopping 24 number $4,000 $96,000 workshops with local stakeholders (40 persons) 1.3.2 Technical assistance Initial Training of IC/CQS 1 number $12,000 $12,000 Trainers and development of training materials and operations manuals: Vine production Initial Training of IC/CQS 1 number $12,000 $12,000 Trainers and development of training materials and operations manuals: Nutrient-rich food crop marketing Initial Training of IC/CQS 1 number $12,000 $12,000 Trainers and development of training materials and operations manuals: CAPs Initial Training of IC/CQS 1 number $15,000 $15,000 Trainers and development of training materials and operations manuals: CHP, AHP, HW (ANC) and conditional food transfer pilot 1.3.3 Training, refresher training, and supportive supervision of community level mobilizers Vine producers- 40 persons $450 $18,000 initial training Marketing 80 persons $75 $6,000 Agents-initial training CAP-initial 80 persons $125 $10,000 training CHP-initial 160 persons $250 $40,000 training AHP-initial 160 persons $125 $20,000 training Vine producers- 480 person round $25 $12,000 refresher training Marketing 480 person round $25 $12,000 Agents-refresher training CAP-refresher 480 person round $25 $12,000 training CHP-refresher 5760 person round $2 $11,520 training AHP-refresher 5760 person round $2 $11,520 training Program IC 576 person month $250 $144,000 Assistant (PA) consultant fee (training, refresher training, supportive supervision) PA Local travel 576 Trips per month $50 $28,800 PA Initial training 16 person $675 $10,800 PA Refresher 288 person round $45 $12,960 training Capacity- IC 72 person month $700 $50,400 Building Coordinator (CBC) consultant fee (Training, refresher training, supportive supervision of community training sessions) CBC Local travel 72 monthly trips $250 $18,000 Capacity-Building IC 36 person month $1,500 $54,000 Manager (CBM) consultant fee (Training, refresher training, supportive supervision of community training sessions) CBM Local travel 36 monthly trips $400 $14,400 SUBTOTAL: 1.3 $633,400 SUBTOTAL COMPONENT 1 $2,215,016 Component 2. Financial products pilot Loan fund 300 farmers $300 $90,000 Voucher scheme 300 farmers $5 $1,500 Price insurance 300 farmers $10 $3,000 SUBTOTAL: 2.1 $94,500 SUBTOTAL COMPONENT 2 $94,500 Component 3. Monitoring and Evaluation, and Knowledge/Results Dissemination 3.1 Monitoring 3.1.1 Monitoring Consultant fee: IC/CQS 6 person month $1,000 $6,000 Monitoring Consultant travel 6 trips $500 $3,000 SUBTOTAL: 3.1 $9,000 3.2 Evaluation and Operations Research 3.2.1 Research consultancy Consultant fee: IC/CQS 36 person month $1,500 $54,000 Research Associate Travel costs for 18 Trips $500 $9,000 Research Associate 3.2.2 Evaluation surveys (outsourced) Baseline survey IC/CQS 6000 Respondents $13 $78,000 Follow-up survey IC/CQS 6000 Respondents $13 $78,000 SUBTOTAL: 3.2 $219,000 3.3 Knowledge dissemination 3.3.1 National workshops: lessons learned 2 national local shopping 2 number $15,000 $30,000 workshops with stakeholders SUBTOTAL: 3.3 $30,000 SUBTOTAL COMPONENT 3 $258,000 4. COMPONENT: Project Management and Administration 4.1 Operational expenses Overhead costs Office rent 216 office month $400 $86,400 Utilities 216 office month $100 $21,600 Mobile talk time 684 person month $50 $34,200 Stationery 216 office month $50 $10,800 SUBTOTAL: 4.1 $153,000 4.2 Auditing and Financial control Consultant fee- IC/CQS 36 person month $1,000 $36,000 financial control (local) Consultant fee- IC/CQS 12 person month $1,000 $12,000 Auditing Consultant fee - IC/CQS 24 person month $500 $12,000 Audit Assistants Travel of Audit 48 trips $400 $19,200 Assistants SUBTOTAL: 4.2 $79,200 SUBTOTAL COMPONENT 4 $232,200 Total project expenses excluding bank supervision $2,799,716 Bank Incremental cost $200,000 TOTAL GRANT REQUESTED: $2,999,716 i National Planning Authority (2010). National Development Plan 2010/11-2014/15. http://www.unpei.org/PDF/uganda- NDP_April_2010.pdf ii Data from CAS. In addition, Uganda Nutrition Action Plan, 2011-16, p. 6 estimates poverty rates decreased from 39% in 2002 to 23% in 2009-10. See also: UNDP and UNDP/Uganda. 2007. Millennium Development Goals: Uganda’s Progress Report 2007. Geneva: UNDP. http://www.undp.or.ug/mdgs/25 iii THE WORLD BANK, Nutrition at a glance: Uganda. 2010. Produced with support from the Japan Trust Fund for Scaling up Nutrition. http://siteresources.worldbank.org/NUTRITION/Resources/281846-1271963823772/Uganda.pdf iv FANTA-2. The Analysis of the Nutrition Situation in Uganda. Food and Nutrition Technical Assistance II Project (FANTA-2), Washington, DC: AED, 2010. www.fantaproject.org/downloads/pdfs/Uganda_NSA_May2010.pdf; Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBOS) and Macro International Inc. 2007. Uganda Demographic and Health Survey 2006. , op. cit. v Charlotte Johnson-Welch, Kerry MacQuarrie, Sandra Bunch. 2005. A Leadership Strategy for Reducing Hunger and Malnutrition in Africa: The Agriculture-Nutrition Advantage project. International Center for Research on Women (ICRW). http://www.icrw.org/publications/leadership-strategy-reducing-hunger-and-malnutrition-africa vi 28% of preschool aged children and 23% of pregnant women and 49% of women of childbearing age; WHO. 2009. Global Prevalence of Vitamin A Deficiency in Populations at Risk 1995-2005. WHO Global Database on Vitamin A Deficiency. vii 64% of preschool aged children, 41% of pregnant women and 49% women of childbearing age have iron deficiency anemia according to WHO. 2008. Worldwide Prevalence of Anemia 1993–2005: WHO Global Database on Anemia. viii World Bank, op. cit., citing data from WHO Global Database on Child Growth and Malnutrition ix UNdata, Under five mortality rate (U5MR), 2009; http://data.un.org/Data.aspx?d=SOWC&f=inID%3A17 x The Republic of Uganda, Uganda Nutrition Action Plan, 2011-16: Scaling up multi-sectoral efforts to establish a strong nutrition foundation for Uganda’s development. 2011. http://www.ugan.ug xi Uganda National Household Survey of 2009-10 xii Uganda National Household Survey of 2009-10 xiii Republic of Uganda, Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry & Fisheries, 2010. Agriculture for Food and Income Security. Agriculture Sector Development Strategy and Investment Plan: 2010/11-2014/15. July, http://www.agriculture.go.ug/index.php?page=publications&id=313 xiv Uganda Nutrition Action Plan 2011-2016; http://www.fantaproject.org/downloads/pdfs/Uganda_NutritionActionPlan_Nov2011.pdf xv Government of Uganda (2003) The Uganda Food and Nutrition Policy. http://www.fao.org/righttofood/inaction/countrylist/Uganda/Uganda_foodandnutritionpolicy.pdf