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Executive Summary
Anticipatory Action (AA) refers to measures taken to mitigate the humanitarian impact of an anticipated hazard before its occurrence. AA embodies a humanitarian strategy to preserve lives and livelihoods while minimising damages, alleviating suffering, and managing shock(s).
In October 2023, with the onset of El Niño and resultant above-average rainfall and as preidentified weather forecast thresholds were crossed, WFP, in close coordination with the Somalia Disaster Management Agency (SODMA), activated a flood anticipatory action programme - its first in Africa - building on the foundations laid by the national flood anticipatory action framework. WFP also activated Flood Response (FR) to assist the people affected.
Following the implementation of the AA and FR, WFP undertook a comprehensive study to assess the effectiveness of these measures in informing households (HHs) of impending disaster, reducing losses, and enabling HHs to meet their food needs. The study involved interviews with 1,450 households, including AA and FR households and a control group (CG) who had not received any assistance from December 2023 to February 2024. Additionally, WFP conducted 10 focus group discussions (FGDs) in April 2024 to further qualify the quantitative findings, ensuring a robust and nuanced understanding of the impact of AA and FR.
The AA’s early warning radio messaging reached 442,209 people, while the cash transfer (mobile money) intervention reached 218,718 people.
Additionally, 154,773 vulnerable households were evacuated by four boats to safer/higher grounds.
At the Outcome level, the key survey findings were as follows:
The AA intervention increased awareness and access to timely and valuable early warning information (EWI) and flood advisories.
The AA also increased the respondents’ access to climate and weather risk information by 15.3 per cent and receipt of early warning messages (EWMs) by 27.0 per cent.
The AA and FR interventions improved food security levels. The provision of AA assistance increased the share of households reporting acceptable food consumption scores by 13.5%.
For the households of the FR, the effect was even more significant, increasing the acceptable FCS share by 35.1%.
Providing FR assistance reduced the prevalence of consumption-based coping strategies (rCSI). Specifically, it increased the proportion of households that reported a ‘good/neutral’ rCSI score by 17.5%. The effect of AA assistance on lowering rCSI was less than that of the FR.
The AA and FR households reported enhanced resilience to the adverse effects of riverine floods, with significant reductions in damages and losses. The AA households had an increased Climate Services Score (CSS) compared to the FR. In contrast, the CG households had weak resilience, evidenced by their response to the negative impacts of floods.
Regarding WFP assistance, populations felt safe and dignified and had unhindered access to it.
For AA and FR interventions, the proportion of respondents who accessed WFP assistance safely was 99% and 100%; they remarked that WFP staff treated them respectfully and received assistance on time.
These findings suggest the following recommendations for similar future interventions:
• Enhancing targeting with a gender lens and gender disaggregation of the people. This approach can promote gender transformative programming and gender disaggregation of results during reporting.
• Timely engagement of the communities’ leaders in identifying control groups that adhere to the vulnerability criteria. This measure will enable the comparability of results across the three groups (cohorts), thus improving the measurement of the interventions’ effects.
• Continue creating awareness about women’s involvement in the decisionmaking processes. This activity will promote gender inclusivity in decision-making and thus improve household resource allocation.
• Improve the community’s participation in humanitarian assistance activities.
WFP can enhance this by informing the communities of their role in the project/ program and their entitlements, embracing downward accountability, and informing them of all the project-related information to take an active role.
• Consider the timing of intervention activities – re-evaluate the frequency of sharing early warning messages as the disaster time approaches and check on the most appropriate time of disbursing the cash transfer to the people.
• Coordinated and complementary programming – with other agencies present in the locations where WFP and partners implement projects, WFP should coordinate with these organisations and identify each agency’s work to complement. This collaborative effort will ensure a holistic address of people’s needs and reduce the chances of duplication.