Moving forward and the contribution of WFP

Nicaragua is one of the poorest countries of Latin America and half of the population lives below the national poverty line. Why are people so poor and why does the country not move forward in the way that other border countries do? Culture is a big cause of the huge poverty in Nicaragua. One example how culture affects the poverty rate are eating habits. People eat rice with beans and maize tortillas every day, often three times a day. They do not eat fruits or vegetables while there are available almost in all places in the country. In addition, people consume so much sugar and oil here that more than half of the women in Nicaragua are obese. As you could imagine, this has huge health care implications for Nicaragua and good health care is often not available or not affordable to many people in Nicaragua.

 Another cause of the huge poverty rate in Nicaragua is the lack of education. Many children in communities are not able to go to school because there is no school of they have to work in the field to help their parents. Also, the mentality of children is not very ambitious. Many children and their parents are not willing to learn and do not see the added value of education to their lives.

 A fourth cause of the poverty in Nicaragua is the dependability of the harvest. People often only work in agriculture and cultivate their own land. Many people have almost no income and are therefore solely dependable of the quality of the harvest. When it is good, they have enough food and they can sometimes even sell food to generate an income. However, when something’s unexpected happens like heavy rainfall or a draught, people loose their harvest. This means that they have neither food production nor an income to buy food.

 WFP has several programs which help the people in Nicaragua and helps them overcome the poverty issues. The most important program of WFP Nicaragua is emergency operations. In cooperation with the Nicaraguan government WFP quickly responds to an emergency by analyzing the situation and if necessary provide food to the needy. In this way people have food when something goes wrong and that makes them a little less dependable of the harvest.

 In addition, they have three other regular programs; the Mother and Child Program, School Feeding and Food for Asset Creation. The Mother and Child Program is aimed at pregnant/lactating women and small children and provides these beneficiaries with food, when they visit the local health centre for a check up. In this way, the health can be checked of the women and the children and they receive food at the same time. The third program, School Feeding provides children with a daily meal at school. This gives parents an incentive to send their children to school. Therefore, more children go to school and the level of education slowly improves. The last program is a long-term program aimed at women. WFP in cooperation with local organisations teaches women to make a garden and harvest different types of vegetables and fruits. In this way, they have a balanced healthy diet for them and their family and they can sell their food in the market and thereby generating money. This program improves eating habits of people, thereby reducing the amount of visits to health centres.

 As you can see, all WFP programs some long-term and some short-term contribute to mayor issues in Nicaragua.