Download or read book Maintaining food and nutrition security in Myanmar during the COVID 19 crisis Lessons from India s lockdown written by International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2020-04-09 with total page 6 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The recent sudden imposition of a stringent 21-day lockdown in India in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic has adversely affected the food security of many vulnerable Indians. These impacts highlight the many challenges that this kind of anti-COVID intervention can pose in other settings where the labor force is mostly informally employed with poor job security and low wages, and where the agri-food systems is similarly informal with widespread use of open-air markets. Myanmar is such a setting. India’s chastening experience with food security during its lockdown suggests the following actions would be imperative for maintaining food security in Myanmar: • Allow the free movement of all goods. A stable and reliable agri-food system requires free movements of a wide range of food products (including micronutrient-rich fruits, vegetables and animal-sourced foods) as well as essential non-food goods. • Monitor food markets and agricultural value chains as closely as possible to address problems when they do arise. • Reduce risk of COVID-19 contagion by improving hygiene in Myanmar’s food markets. • Issue clear directives to police, military, and local authorities not to impede the movement of goods. The Government of Myanmar should learn from the mistakes made in India and other developing countries. We must recognize that basic food and nutrition security must be maintained at all times through this complex health and socioeconomic crisis.

Download or read book Maintaining food and nutrition security in Myanmar during the COVID 19 crisis Lessons from India s lockdown in Burmese written by International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2020-04-13 with total page 9 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: COVID-19ကမ􀈪ာ့ကပ်ေရာဂါကာလအတွင်း မ􀆭ကာေသးမီက အိ􀇳􀈤ိယ􀇳ိုင်ငံတွင် ၂၁ရက်􀆭ကာ တင်း􀆭ကပ်ေသာ ပိတ်ဆို့ကန့်သတ်မ􀋪 (lockdown)ကို 􀇸ုတ်တရက်ချမှတ်ခဲ့ြခင်းသည် ထိခိုက်လွယ်သည့် များစွာေသာ အိ􀇳􀈤ိယ􀇳ိုင်ငံသားများ၏ အစားအစာဖူလံုမ􀋪ကို ဆိုးကျိုးများ ြဖစ်ေပါ်ေစခဲ့ပါသည်။ လုပ်သားအများစုသည် မေရရာေသာ လုပ်ခနည်းသည့် ကျပမ်းအလုပ်လုပ်ကိုင်သူများြဖစ်􀆱ပီး လဟာြပင်ေစျး များကိုသာ ကျယ်ကျယ်ြပန့်ြပန့် အသံုးြပုလျက်􀇹ှိသည့် စနစ်ြဖင့်ချုပ်ကိုင်ထားမ􀋪နည်းေသာ(informal) အစားအစာစိုက်ပျိုးထုတ်လုပ်ေရး စနစ်􀇹ှိသည့် ေနာက်ခံဝန်းကျင်များတွင် အစိုးရ၏ ထိုသို့ေသာ COVID-19ကာကွယ်ေရးလုပ်ငန်းများသည် စိန်ေခါ်မ􀋪များစွာ ြဖစ်ေစ􀇳ိုင်ေ􀆭ကာင်း အိ􀇳􀈤ိယမှြဖစ်ရပ်များက မီးေမာင်းထိုးြပေနပါသည်။ ြမန်မာ􀇳ိုင်ငံသည် ထိုသို့ေသာေနာက်ခံဝန်းကျင်􀇹ှိသည့် 􀇳ိုင်ငံတစ်􀇳ိုင်ငံ ြဖစ်ပါသည်။ အိ􀇳􀈤ိယ၏lockdownကာလအတွင်း စားနပ်ရိက􀈓ာဖူလံုေရး􀇳ှင့်ပတ်သတ်သည့် ချို􀋺ယွင်းချက်များစွာ􀇹ှိခဲ့ေသာ အေတွ􀋺အ􀆭ကံုက ြမန်မာ􀇳ိုင်ငံ၏ အစားအစာဖူလံုမ􀋪ကိုထိန်းသိမ်းရန်အတွက် ေအာက်ပါလုပ်ငန်းများသည် အ လွန်အ ေရး􀆳ကီးေ􀆭ကာင်း အ􀆭ကံုြပုေနပါသည်။ • ကုန်စည်အမျိုးအစားအားလံုးအား လွပ်လပ်စွာ စီးဆင်းခွင့်ေပးြခင်း- တည်􀆱ငိမ်ေသာ အစားအစာစိုက်ပျိုးထုတ်လုပ် ေရးစနစ်သည် အစားအစာအမျိုးအမည်အစံု (အနည်းလိုအာဟာရများ􀇤ကယ်ဝသည့် သစ်သီးဝလံများ၊ ဟင်းသီးဟင်းရွက်များ၊ တိရစ􀈘ာန်များမှရေသာ အစားအစာများ အပါအဝင်)􀇳ှင့်အတူ မ􀇹ှိမြဖစ်လိုအပ်ေသာ စားစရာမဟုတ်သည့်ကုန်စည်များပါ လွပ်လပ်စွာ စီးဆင်းမ􀋪􀇹ှိေစရန် လိုအပ် ပါသည်။ • ြပဿနာများေပါ်ေပါက်လာပါက ၎င်းတို့ကိုေြဖ􀇹ှင်း􀇳ိုင်ရန် အစားအစာေစျးကွက်များ􀇳ှင့် တန်ဖိုးကွင်းဆက်များကို ြဖစ်􀇳ိုင်သမ􀈂 နီးကပ်စွာ ေစာင့်􀆭ကည့်ြခင်း • ြမန်မာ􀇳ိုင်ငံအတွင်း􀇹ှိ အစားအစာေရာင်းချသည့်ေစျးများတွင် သန့်􀇹ှင်းမ􀋪ကိုြမ􀋁င့်တင်ြခင်းြဖင့် COVID-19ပျံ􀋺􀇳ှံ့􀇳ိုင်မ􀋪အ􀇳􀈢ရာယ်ကို ေလ􀈂ာ့ချ ြခင်း • ကုန်စည်စီးဆင်းမ􀋪ကို မတားဆီးေစရန် ရဲ၊စစ်တပ်􀇳ှင့်အြခားေဒသအာဏာပိုင်များသို့ 􀇹ှင်းလင်းေသာ 􀇷􀈄န်􀆭ကားချက်များ ထုတ်ြပန် ထားြခင်း ြမန်မာအစိုးရသည် ဤ􀇸􀋪ပ်ေထွးေသာ ကျန်းမာေရး􀇳ှင့်လူမ􀋪စီးပွားေရးအကျပ်အတည်းကာလတေလ􀈂ာက် အချိန်တိုင်းတွင် အေြခခံအစားအစာ􀇳ှင့်အာဟာရဖူလံုမ􀋪ကို ထိန်းသိမ်းရမည်ြဖစ်ေ􀆭ကာင်း အိ􀇳􀈤ိယ􀇳ှင့်အြခားဖွံ􀋺􀆱ဖိုးဆဲ􀇳ိုင်ငံများ၏ အမှားအယွင်းများမှ သင်ခန်းစာရယူသင့်ပါသည်။

Download or read book The impacts of the COVID 19 crisis on maternal and child malnutrition in Myanmar What to expect and how to protect written by Headey, Derek D. and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2020-07-16 with total page 15 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The COVID-19 crisis in Myanmar poses a very serious risk to the nutritional status of vulnerable populations, notably women and children, as well as poor urban populations and internally displaced persons. The COVID-19 crisis will hit vulnerable groups through multiple mechanisms.

Download or read book Impacts of COVID 19 on Myanmar s agri food system Evidence base and policy implications written by Researchers of the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2020-10-09 with total page 18 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Between April and October 2020, the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and Michigan State University (MSU), with support from the United States Agency of International Development (USAID) and the Livelihoods and Food Security Fund (LIFT), have undertaken analyses of secondary data combined with regular telephone surveys of actors at all stages of Myanmar’s agri-food system in order to better understand the impacts of COVID-19 on the system. These analyses show that the volume of agribusiness has slowed considerably in Myanmar since COVID-19 restrictions were put in place. There is lower demand from farmers for agricultural inputs and mechanization services and lower volumes of produce traded, especially exports to neighboring countries whose borders are closed. All actors in the agri-food system are facing liquidity constraints and experiencing increased difficulties in both borrowing and recovering loans.

Download or read book Strengthening smallholder agriculture is essential to defend food and nutrition security and rural livelihoods in Myanmar against the COVID 19 threat Elements for a proactive response written by Boughton, Duncan and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2020-04-16 with total page 11 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There is an urgent need to anticipate and mitigate the threat posed by COVID-19 to Myanmar’s agricultural sector and to rural households that depend on farming for income and for food and nutrition security. We evaluate options to address the threat and to support farmers to prepare their land and plant their crops on time in the short window before the start of the 2020 monsoon cropping season. Recognizing that no single intervention can address the full range of vulnerabilities faced by rural households, we recommend a combination: • Expansion of access to seasonal farm credit with extended loan repayment schedules; • Limited agricultural input subsidies targeting certified seed; and • Implementation of a cash transfer program to smallholder farmers. Despite the high cost of a cash transfer program, there are good reasons to expect that the benefits of such support to farm households will outweigh program costs in monetary terms – even more so if the economic benefits from the consequent lower incidence of malnutrition to which the program would contribute can be measured.

Download or read book Poverty food insecurity and social protection during COVID 19 in Myanmar Combined evidence from a household telephone survey and micro simulations written by Headey, Derek D. and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2020-11-10 with total page 13 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study assesses the welfare impacts of COVID-19 on households in Myanmar by combining recent high-frequency telephone survey evidence for two specific rural and urban geographies with national-level survey-based simulations designed to assess ex-ante impacts on poverty with differing amounts of targeted cash transfers. The first source of evidence – the COVID-19 Rural and Urban Food Security Survey (C19- RUFSS) – consists of four rounds of monthly data collected from a sample of over 2,000 households, all with young children or pregnant mothers, divided evenly between urban and peri-urban Yangon and the rural Dry Zone. This survey sheds light on household incomes prior to COVID-19 (January 2020), incomes and food security status soon after the first COVID-19 wave (June 2020), the gradual economic recovery thereafter (July and August 2020), and the start of the second COVID-19 wave in September and October 2020. This survey gives timely and high-quality evidence on the recent welfare impacts of COVID-19 for two important geographies and for households that are nutritionally highly vulnerable to shocks due to the presence of very young children or pregnant mothers. However, the relatively narrow geographic and demographic focus of this telephone survey and the need for forecasting the poverty impacts of COVID-19 into 2021 prompt us to explore simulationbased evidence derived by applying parameter shocks to household models developed from nationally representative household survey data collected prior to COVID-19, the 2015 Myanmar Poverty and Living Conditions Survey (MPLCS). By realistically simulating the kinds of disruptions imposed on Myanmar’s economy by both international forces, e.g., lower agricultural exports and workers’ remittances, and domestic COVID-19 prevention measures. e.g., stay-at-home orders and temporary business closures, we not only can predict the impacts of COVID-19 on household poverty at the rural, urban, and national levels, but also can assess the further benefits to household welfare of social protection in the form of monthly household cash transfers of different magnitudes. Combined, these two sources of evidence yield insights on both the on-the-ground impacts of COVID-19 in recent months and the potential poverty reduction impacts of social protection measures in the coming year. We conclude the study with a discussion of the policy implications of these findings.

Download or read book The impacts of the COVID 19 crisis on maternal and child malnutrition in Myanmar What to expect and how to protect in Burmese written by Headey, Derek D. and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2020-07-30 with total page 16 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Impact of a gender and nutrition behavioral change communication amid the COVID 19 crisis in Myanmar s Central Dry Zone written by Myanmar Agriculture Policy Support Activity (MAPSA) and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2022-04-19 with total page 29 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Social behavior change communication (SBCC) interventions on gender and nutrition are now commonly implemented, but their impact on diet quality and empowerment is rarely assessed rigorously. We estimate the impact of a nutrition and gender SBCC intervention on women’s dietary diversity and empowerment in Myanmar during an especially challenging period—the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. The intervention was implemented as a cluster-randomized controlled trial in 30 villages in Myanmar’s Central Dry Zone. Our analysis employs data from the baseline survey implemented in February 2020 and a phone survey implemented in February–March 2021 and focuses on women’s dietary diversity and sub-indicators of the project-level women’s empowerment in agriculture index (pro-WEAI). Two indicators of women’s empowerment―inputs to productive decisions and access to and decisions over credit―improved, indicating that SBCC interventions can contribute to changing gendered perceptions and behaviors; however, most of the empowerment indicators did not change, indicating that much of gendered norms and beliefs take time to change. Women’s dietary diversity scores were higher by half a food group out of 10 in treatment villages. More women in treatment villages consumed nuts, milk, meat or fish, and Vitamin A–rich foods daily than in control villages. We show that even in the setting of a pandemic, a SBCC intervention can be delivered through a range of tools, including household visits, phone-based coaching, and voice-based training, that are responsive to local and individual resource limitations. Gender messaging can change some gendered perceptions; but it may take more time to change deeply ingrained gender norms. Nutrition messaging can help counter the declines in dietary quality that would be expected from negative shocks to supply chains and incomes.

Download or read book Poverty and food insecurity during COVID 19 Telephone survey evidence from mothers in rural and urban Myanmar written by Headey, Derek D. and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2020-10-07 with total page 28 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Myanmar had one of the lowest confirmed COVID-19 caseloads in the world in mid-2020 and was one of the few developing countries not projected to go into economic recession. However, macroeconomic projections are likely to be a poor guide to individual and household welfare in a fast-moving crisis that has involved disruption to an unusually wide range of sectors and livelihoods. To explore the impacts of COVID-19 disruptions on household poverty and coping strategies, as well as maternal food insecurity experiences, this study used a telephone survey conducted in June and July 2020 covering 2,017 mothers of nutritionally vulnerable young children in urban Yangon and rural villages of Myanmar’s Dry Zone. Stratifying results by location, livelihoods, and asset-levels, and using retrospective questions on pre-COVID-19 incomes and various COVID-19 impacts, we find that the vast majority of households have been adversely affected from loss of income and employment. Over three-quarters cite income/job losses as the main impact of COVID-19 – median incomes declined by one third and $1.90/day income-based poverty rose by around 27 percentage points between January and June 2020. Falling into poverty was most strongly associated with loss of employment (including migrant employment), but also with recent childbirth. The poor commonly coped with income losses through taking loans/credit, while better-off households drew down on savings and reduced non-food expenditures. Self-reported food insecurity experiences were much more common in the urban sample than in the rural sample, even though income-based and asset-based poverty were more prevalent in rural areas. In urban areas, around one quarter of respondents were worried about food quantities and quality, and around 10 percent stated that there were times when they had run out of food or gone hungry. Respondents who stated that their household had lost income or experienced food supply problems due to COVID-19 were more likely to report a variety of different food insecurity experiences. These results raise the concern that the welfare impacts of the COVID-19 crisis are much more serious and widespread than macroeconomic projections would suggest. Loss of employment and casual labor are major drivers of increasing poverty. Consequently, economic recovery strategies must emphasize job creation to revitalize damaged livelihoods. However, a strengthened social protection strategy should also be a critical component of economic recovery to prevent adversely affected households from falling into poverty traps and to avert the worst forms of food insecurity and malnutrition, particularly among households with pregnant women and young children. The recent second wave of COVID-19 infections in Myanmar from mid-August onwards makes the expansion of social protection even more imperative.

Download or read book Urban food prices under lockdown Evidence from Myanmar s traditional food retail sector during COVID 19 written by Goeb, Joseph and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2021-05-27 with total page 23 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Many governments imposed stringent lockdowns during the COVID-19 pandemic as a public health measure to suppress the spread of the disease. With consumer incomes already depressed, the potential impacts of these measures on urban food prices are of particular concern. This working paper examines the changes in Myanmar’s urban food prices during lockdown using detailed food price data collected from a panel of phone surveys conducted in August and September 2020 of 431 family-owned retail shops in Myanmar’s two largest cities, Yangon and Mandalay. We find that the supply side of Myanmar’s food retail sector was largely resilient to the shocks and lockdowns throughout the first six months of the COVID-19 pandemic. Estimates from a fixed effects differencein-differences model reveal that food prices were 3 percent higher in townships under lockdown compared to those not under lockdown, a statistically significant but modest effect. Lockdowns had smaller effects on prices for highly processed food items sourced directly from companies, but larger effects on prices for raw or lightly processed commodities sourced through wholesale markets, which comprise a larger share of urban consumer’s diets. Retailer margins did not change significantly under lockdown restrictions, suggesting no evidence of price gouging. Overall, our findings of a modest impact of the lockdown on urban food prices underscore the importance of keeping the food supply chain–including wholesale markets and retail shops–functioning as completely and as safely as possible during times of crisis, as was mostly the case early in the crisis for the two cities in this study.

Download or read book Impacts of COVID 19 on food security Panel data evidence from Nigeria written by Amare, Mulubrhan and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2020-08-11 with total page 43 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This paper combines pre-pandemic face-to-face survey data with follow up phone surveys collected in April-May 2020 to quantify the overall and differential impacts of COVID-19 on household food security, labor market participation and local food prices in Nigeria. We exploit spatial variation in exposure to COVID-19 related infections and lockdown measures along with temporal differences in our outcomes of interest using a difference-in-difference approach. We find that those households exposed to higher COVID-19 cases or mobility lockdowns experience a significant increase in measures of food insecurity. Examining possible transmission channels for this effect, we find that COVID-19 significantly reduces labor market participation and increases food prices. We find that impacts differ by economic activities and households. For instance, lockdown measures increased households' experience of food insecurity by 12 percentage points and reduced the probability of participation in non-farm business activities by 13 percentage points. These lockdown measures have smaller impacts on wage-related activities and farming activities. In terms of food security, households relying on non-farm businesses, poorer households, those with school-aged children, and those living in remote and conflicted-affected zones have experienced relatively larger deteriorations in food insecurity. These findings can help inform immediate and medium-term policy responses, including social protection policies aiming at ameliorating the impacts of the pandemic, as well as guide targeting strategies of governments and international donor agencies by identifying the most impacted sub-populations.

Download or read book COVID 19 and global food security Two years later written by McDermott, John and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2022-03-07 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Two years after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the health, economic, and social disruptions caused by this global crisis continue to evolve. The impacts of the pandemic are likely to endure for years to come, with poor, marginalized, and vulnerable groups the most affected. In COVID-19 & Global Food Security: Two Years Later, the editors bring together contributions from new IFPRI research, blogs, and the CGIAR COVID-19 Hub to examine the pandemic’s effects on poverty, food security, nutrition, and health around the world. This volume presents key lessons learned on food security and food system resilience in 2020 and 2021 and assesses the effectiveness of policy responses to the crisis. Looking forward, the authors consider how the pandemic experience can inform both recovery and longer-term efforts to build more resilient food systems.

Download or read book Poverty and Food Insecurity During COVID 19 written by Derek Headey and published by . This book was released on 2020 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Myanmar had one of the lowest confirmed COVID-19 caseloads in the world in mid-2020 and was one of the few developing countries not projected to go into economic recession. However, macroeconomic projections are likely to be a poor guide to individual and household welfare in a fast-moving crisis that has involved disruption to an unusually wide range of sectors and livelihoods. To explore the impacts of COVID-19 disruptions on household poverty and coping strategies, as well as maternal food insecurity experiences, this study used a telephone survey conducted in June and July 2020 covering 2,017 mothers of nutritionally vulnerable young children in urban Yangon and rural villages of Myanmar's Dry Zone.Stratifying results by location, livelihoods, and asset-levels, and using retrospective questions on pre-COVID-19 incomes and various COVID-19 impacts, we find that the vast majority of households have been adversely affected from loss of income and employment. Over three-quarters cite income/job losses as the main impact of COVID-19 - median incomes declined by one third and $1.90/day income-based poverty rose by around 27 percentage points between January and June 2020. Falling into poverty was most strongly associated with loss of employment (including migrant employment), but also with recent childbirth. The poor commonly coped with income losses through taking loans/credit, while better-off households drew down on savings and reduced non-food expenditures. Self-reported food insecurity experiences were much more common in the urban sample than in the rural sample, even though income-based and asset-based poverty were more prevalent in rural areas. In urban areas, around one quarter of respondents were worried about food quantities and quality, and around 10 percent stated that there were times when they had run out of food or gone hungry. Respondents who stated that their household had lost income or experienced food supply problems due to COVID-19 were more likely to report a variety of different food insecurity experiences.These results raise the concern that the welfare impacts of the COVID-19 crisis are much more serious and widespread than macroeconomic projections would suggest. Loss of employment and casual labor are major drivers of increasing poverty. Consequently, economic recovery strategies must emphasize job creation to revitalize damaged livelihoods. However, a strengthened social protection strategy should also be a critical component of economic recovery to prevent adversely affected households from falling into poverty traps and to avert the worst forms of food insecurity and malnutrition, particularly among households with pregnant women and young children. The recent second wave of COVID-19 infections in Myanmar from mid-August onwards makes the expansion of social protection even more imperative.

Download or read book Monitoring the impacts of COVID 19 in Myanmar Food vendors November 2020 survey round written by Oo, Than Zaw and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2020-12-17 with total page 8 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This policy note presents results from five rounds of a telephone survey with food vendors conducted in different rural and urban zones of the country, focusing on results from the last round completed. The purpose of the survey is to provide data and insights to the government, development partners, and interested stakeholders to understand the COVID-19 related shocks on Myanmar’s food markets. In particular, the note explores prevention measures, changes in shopping behavior, difficulties in food vendor operations due to the COVID-19 crisis, changes in availability and prices of foods, perceived changes in consumption, and suggested policy actions by these food vendors.

Download or read book COVID 19 and food security in Ethiopia Do social protection programs protect written by Abay, Kibrom A. and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2020-11-11 with total page 46 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: We assess the impact of Ethiopia’s flagship social protection program, the Productive Safety Net Program (PSNP) on the adverse impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on food and nutrition security of households, mothers, and children. We use both pre-pandemic in-person household survey data and a post-pandemic phone survey. Two thirds of our respondents reported that their incomes had fallen after the pandemic began and almost half reported that their ability to satisfy their food needs had worsened. Employing a household fixed effects difference-in-difference approach, we find that the household food insecurity increased by 11.7 percentage points and the size of the food gap by 0.47 months in the aftermath of the onset of the pandemic. Participation in the PSNP offsets virtually all of this adverse change; the likelihood of becoming food insecure increased by only 2.4 percentage points for PSNP households and the duration of the food gap increased by only 0.13 months. The protective role of PSNP is greater for poorer households and those living in remote areas. Results are robust to definitions of PSNP participation, different estimators and how we account for the non-randomness of mobile phone ownership. PSNP households were less likely to reduce expenditures on health and education by 7.7 percentage points and were less likely to reduce expenditures on agricultural inputs by 13 percentage points. By contrast, mothers’ and children’s diets changed little, despite some changes in the composition of diets with consumption of animal source foods declining significantly.

Download or read book Myanmar s poverty and food insecurity crisis Support to agriculture and food assistance is urgently needed to preserve a foundation for recovery written by Myanmar Agriculture Policy Support Activity (MAPSA) and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2021-07-13 with total page 19 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: National poverty rates in Myanmar have risen dramatically due to economic disruption following the February 1, 2021 military take-over of government. Depending on assumptions about the scale of the economic impacts, household poverty rates are predicted to have risen to between 40 and 50 percent in 2021, compared to 32 percent in 2015 and just under 25 percent in 2017. Between 849,000 and 1.87 million new households are thus living in poverty in 2021 in addition to the estimated 2.86 million households already in poverty in 2015. The poverty impacts of these disruptions are significant not only in the sharp increases in the total number of households in poverty, but also in the substantial deepening of poverty for households that were already poor. By the end of the current financial year, the average poverty gap (expenditure shortfall) is predicted to have increased from 26 percent in 2015 to between 34 and 40 percent for individuals living in poor households.

Download or read book Monitoring the impact of COVID 19 in Myanmar Urban food retailers Early July 2020 survey round written by Masias, Ian and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2020-08-27 with total page 7 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Traditional family owned retail shops are the backbone of Myanmar’s consumer market. As the final node in the grocery supply chain, they sell all types of dry foods, i.e., processed and packaged, condiments, snacks, and beverages to final consumers. To some extent, they also supply basic staple grains, i.e., rice and pulses; dairy products; eggs; kitchen crops; and tobacco and alcohol. About 85 percent of all consumer goods in Myanmar are sold through these shops. In the food and grocery sector, these retail outlets, including wet markets, account for 90 percent of all sales, with the other 10 percent accounted for by fast-growing supermarkets. Because of the importance of traditional retail outlets in the last mile delivery of a wide variety of foods to consumers, any challenges they encounter from the COVID-19 crisis and corresponding policy responses to contain the virus have important implications for the availability and affordability of food for final consumers. This policy note is the first in a series of reports presenting results from rounds of a telephone survey of a sample of owners or managers of food retail shops located in the two largest cities in Myanmar, Yangon and Mandalay. The phone surveys are designed to provide a better understanding of the effects of COVID-19 shocks on Myanmar’s agri-food marketing system through the perspective of small-scale food retailers in urban areas. This policy note focuses on the demand side and overall business effects of the COVID-19 crisis on these food retailers. Phone interviews were conducted with 426 retail shop owners or managers between 8 and 15 July 2020. Eighty percent of those surveyed were in Yangon, with the rest in Mandalay.