Zambia Economic Resilience Program (ZERS) Draft Program Description for Comment

The summary for the Zambia Economic Resilience Program (ZERS) Draft Program Description for Comment grant is detailed below. This summary states who is eligible for the grant, how much grant money will be awarded, current and past deadlines, Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance (CFDA) numbers, and a sampling of similar government grants. Verify the accuracy of the data FederalGrants.com provides by visiting the webpage noted in the Link to Full Announcement section or by contacting the appropriate person listed as the Grant Announcement Contact. If any section is incomplete, please visit the website for the Zambia USAID Lusaka, which is the U.S. government agency offering this grant.
Zambia Economic Resilience Program (ZERS) Draft Program Description for Comment: Zambia Economic Resilience Program (ZERS) RFA Draft for Comment APPLICATIONUSAID/Zambia plans to issue a Request for Application (RFA) to award a Cooperative Agreement valued at approximately US$20 to $25 million over four years to increase economic resilience of vulnerable rural households. Send no applications to USAID at this time. This document is released for comment only. The Zambia Economic Resilience (ZERS) for Improved Food Security Program will enhance coping skills, build assets and increase rural incomes for vulnerable households in targeted areas, thereby significantly contributing to Millennium Development Goal 1 of halving the proportion of Zambians living in extreme poverty and suffering from hunger by 2015. ZERS will be a core activity in implementing President Obama's Feed the Future (FTF) global hunger and food security initiative in Zambia. ZERS will contribute to FTF's overarching goal to sustainably reduce global hunger and poverty by tackling their root causes and employing proven strategies for achieving large scale and lasting impact There are two key FTF objectives to achieving this goal: a. Accelerate inclusive agriculture sector growth including  Improved agricultural productivity;  Expanding markets and trade; and,  Increasing economic resilience in vulnerable rural communities. b. Improved Nutritional Status ZERS will build upon USAID-funded activities that link agricultural growth, nutrition and economic resilience efforts. ZERS will implement innovative strategies and approaches to enable vulnerable rural households, the poorest, including those affected by HIV/AIDS and other diseases, orphan and vulnerable child-headed households, and female-headed households, among others, to improve food security through strengthened economic resilience. Special attention will be given to enabling very poor women to participate in expanding opportunities as producers, service providers and entrepreneurs. The geographic focus of these activities is Eastern Province, and possible selected districts in Northern and Central Provinces. ZERS may fund one or several grants subject to the availability of funds. The Government reserves the right not to make any awards if such a decision is determined to be in its best interests. The project term is up to four years. Individual applications do not need to cover all potential geographic areas.   ZERS GOALS AND OBJECTIVES ZERS will increase the food security of 50,000 vulnerable and very poor rural households in targeted areas through implementing interventions that reduce the number of hunger months, improve nutrition and health practices, and increase the value of household assets and the ability of households to productively use those assets. These achievements are expected to contribute significantly to reducing stunting and underweight levels in the targeted households over a four year period. The vulnerable and very poor have some minimum set of assets but have been unable to move towards longer-term economic well-being and health. Frequently donor and government assistance to these households has been in the form of humanitarian relief, economic transfers or subsidies (e.g. of staple foods). Through ZERS, USAID/Zambia seeks to support innovative ideas, concepts and programs to increase the economic resiliency for the very vulnerable Zambian rural population in targeted areas, and reduce the need for humanitarian relief, and importantly, food subsidies. BACKGROUND It is widely recognized that food insecurity stems from a multiplicity of causes including few assets, poor health, exposure to natural and man-made disasters (e.g. floods, droughts, conflict). It is also well documented that the vulnerability status of households is not static, but that households evolve through changing demographic and economic states. However, poverty is also known to be transferred inter-generationally, suggesting that reducing the number of poor and vulnerable households can have a longer term impact on national well-being. There is extensive research on poverty reduction. Along with a demonstrated understanding of the existing knowledge on successful poverty reduction strategies, and experience in implementing successful programs, the Applicant should have an indepth understanding of the Zambian context so as to propose which models are relevant and where innovation is required to adapt to specific contexts. For example, Zambia is not considered to be land-constrained, but recent evidence suggests that access to land is a significant constraint for many households. Rural Zambian households also source up to 30% of their cash earnings from natural resource extraction, one of the factors contributing to Zambia's extremely high deforestation rates. In addition, Zambia has an extremely low population density (13 inhabitants per sq km) and a fairly limited transport infrastructure (12.3 km per 100 sq km of land - 26th out of 58 SSA countries), so access to services and markets are a major constraint. Understanding the relationship between poverty, food insecurity, remoteness, and resource use in Zambia will be critical to the success of program interventions. Despite a bumper maize harvest in 2010, Zambia small holders remain food insecure. Most small holder farmers in the targeted areas have less than 2 ha of land and very low productivity; 2 percent of farmers contribute to 50 percent of the marketable maize. Most small holders produce less than 1 ton of maize per ha, which is 20 percent of what could be achieved with improved seed and inputs. This amount is insufficient to meet household needs and therefore most smallholders face a hunger season of several months, which is particularly acute during November, December, January, and February . In addition, there are limited off-farm income opportunities, especially for the poorest and most land constrained, hence a huge number of households go hungry even in a surplus year. Malnutrition rates in Zambia are exceedingly high with 45 percent of children under age 5 stunted The case for improved nutrition is unquestioned where malnutrition is an underlying cause in an estimated 54% of under-5 child deaths . Using dietary diversity as a measure, the 2007 DHS survey found that only 25% of children 6-23 months receive a minimum acceptable diet. In the presence of pervasive rural poverty, addressing malnutrition will require not only the provision of effective nutrition and health services, both at community and facility level, but also a serious effort to address problems of household food insecurity by addressing nutrition practices (particularly feeding practices for infant and young children), diet quality, food preparation and allocation, and intra-household inequities. TARGETING A GRZ Vulnerability Assessment Committee monitors food security-related vulnerability, but there are no official figures for the number of vulnerable households in rural areas. A recent analysis of poverty among agricultural households in Eastern Province showed a great number of poor rural households. Over 80 percent of smallholder households (
Federal Grant Title: Zambia Economic Resilience Program (ZERS) Draft Program Description for Comment
Federal Agency Name: Zambia USAID Lusaka
Grant Categories: Food and Nutrition
Type of Opportunity: Other
Funding Opportunity Number: 611-2011-01
Type of Funding: Cooperative Agreement
CFDA Numbers: Information not provided
CFDA Descriptions: Information not provided
Current Application Deadline: Mar 04, 2011
Original Application Deadline: Mar 04, 2011
Posted Date: February 22nd, 2011
Creation Date: Feb 22, 2011
Archive Date: Mar 10, 2011
Total Program Funding: $25,000,000
Maximum Federal Grant Award: $25,000,000
Minimum Federal Grant Award: $20,000,000
Expected Number of Awards: 1
Cost Sharing or Matching: No
Category Explanation
Draft program descrption for comments
Applicants Eligible for this Grant
Unrestricted (i.e., open to any type of entity above), subject to any clarification in text field entitled "Additional Information on Eligibility"
Grant Announcement Contact
Cecilia Kasoma Acquisition and Assistance Speciali Phone +260 211254303

[email protected] [[email protected]]

FederalGrants.com is not endorsed by, or affiliated with, any government agency. Copyright ©2007-2024 FederalGrants.com