VZCZCXRO5899
RR RUEHRN
DE RUEHDJ #1150/01 2831552
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 101552Z OCT 07
FM AMEMBASSY DJIBOUTI
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 8719
INFO RUEHNR/AMEMBASSY NAIROBI 3284
RUEHRN/USMISSION UN ROME 0001
RUEHDS/AMEMBASSY ADDIS ABABA 3710
RUEHAE/AMEMBASSY ASMARA 2247
RUEHFR/AMEMBASSY PARIS 0964
RUEHLO/AMEMBASSY LONDON 0687
RUEHYN/AMEMBASSY SANAA 1674
RUEKJCS/JOINT STAFF WASHDC
RUEKJCS/SECDEF WASHDC
RHPIGXW/CJTF HOA
RHMFISS/MACDILL AFB FL

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 DJIBOUTI 001150 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE PASS TO USAID 
LONDON, PARIS FOR AFRICA WATCHERS 
NAIROBI FOR USAID/EA 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: ECON EAGR EAID DJ
SUBJECT:  U.S. DEVELOPMENT AID IN DJIBOUTI SCORES SUCCESSES, 
BENEFITS REGION 
 
¶1.  (SBU) SUMMARY:  USAID assistance to Djibouti over the past four 
years has increased food security and raised agricultural incomes in 
Djibouti and its neighbors.  It has helped to stave off famine and 
is reducing the risk of fatalities due to flooding. USAID 
re-established its presence and program in Djibouti on July 9, 2003 
and has achieved these impressive results with an average of $5.0 
million dollars a year in ESF, except in FY 07 when funding was 
reduced to less than $3.0 million.  Djibouti has become a center for 
regional agricultural exports, increasing farm incomes in Somalia 
and Ethiopia; the Government of Djibouti (GODJ) has used improved 
information on drought and nutrition to respond quickly to repeated 
threats of famine, with donor help; and Djibouti has become a major 
pre-positioning center for U.S. stocks of food aid, replacing Dubai. 
END SUMMARY. 
 
------------------------------------- 
Famine Early Warning System (FEWSNET) 
------------------------------------- 
 
¶2.  (SBU) With $1.6 million in USAID funding, the FEWSNET program, 
launched in Djibouti in early 2004, has helped to stave off 
starvation by providing the GODJ and donors timely, accurate 
information on weather, crops, food stocks, and commodity and food 
stuff prices.  FEWSNET's monthly bulletin with food security updates 
provides both satellite information and analysis and ground truth. 
It is used by Djibouti policy and decision makers and by donors and 
private sector actors to make timely, effective decisions to declare 
and respond to emergencies.  FEWSNET saves lives and property by 
tracking threats to food security in rural and urban areas alike. 
By listing price changes in basic commodities and food stuffs it 
uses markets as well as weather and agricultural production 
information to warn of famine and to mitigate harm. 
 
¶3.  (SBU) This FEWSNET system is the first early warning system ever 
established in Djibouti with an office solely dedicated to 
monitoring famine in a chronically food insecure country. FEWSNET 
reports are read by the President and Prime Minster as well as many 
key ministers in the GODJ.  The Prime Minister praised FEWSNET in a 
meeting last week with the Ambassador and the Regional USAID 
Director.  He said that he and the President study it closely and 
use it as a tool to track and respond to potential food crises 
faster than they ever could before.  Thanks to the FEWSNET Bulletin 
they are now aware of rainfall amounts, possible drought areas, and 
crop crises throughout Djibouti on a monthly basis.  (COMMENT:  The 
Prime Minister hails from Djibouti's north country, abutting 
Eritrea, and is a native Afar, Djibouti's largest minority 
population.  What he did not need to say to us last week was that he 
has a personal interest in making sure that remote areas of the 
country, including the chronically famine wracked north avoid 
famine.  In the 1990s, Afars in the north launched a civil war that 
simmered for a decade.  The national government is now a coalition, 
including former rebels and representatives of former opposition 
parties.  Averting famine throughout the nation is one key tool to 
ensure that Djibouti avoids new conflict.  END COMMENT.) 
 
------------------------------ 
FEWSNET's Achievements To Date 
------------------------------ 
 
¶4.  (SBU) Since its inception, FEWSNET has achieved commendable 
results. For example it has: 
- Produced urban and rural livelihood studies leading to profiles 
for Djibouti. 
- Assisted the Government of Djibouti in the establishment of a 
Geographic Information System (GIS) laboratory at Centre d'Etude et 
de Recherches Scientifiques (CERD); the national research center. 
- Trained 16 Government of Djibouti officials in Geographic 
Information System (GIS) Capacity. 
- Succeeded in mapping digitally the entire territory of Djibouti. 
- Compiled and analyzed cereal imports. 
- Developed livestock early warning systems. 
- Initiated the development of a flash flood monitoring and early 
warning system for Djibouti. 
- Monitored food security and provided critical information for the 
successful implementation of the USAID Health program sub-element on 
combating malnutrition. 
 
DJIBOUTI 00001150  002 OF 003 
 
 
- Provided critical drought data and information to Food and 
Agricultural Organization (FAO), the World Food Program (WFP), World 
Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF, and the Government of Djibouti on 
the level of malnutrition in the city of Djibouti and in the rural 
areas where there is drought and chronic food insecurity. 
 
---------------------------------- 
Regional Livestock Export Facility 
---------------------------------- 
 
¶5.  (SBU) In 2004 USAID/Djibouti in collaboration with USAID/EA, 
through the African Union's Inter African Bureau for Animal 
Resources (AU/IBAR) and the RATES Project, financed and completed 
the construction of a pilot, modern, regional livestock marketing 
facility in Djibouti. This public/private sector initiative was 
intended by USAID for the use of all neighboring countries and has 
had exactly that effect.  It includes holding pens, quarantine 
facilities, modern veterinary services, and laboratory services 
on-site. The facility provides large scale holding, examination, 
vaccination, and health certification for livestock being shipped to 
the Middle Eastern and other countries. USAID transferred the 
facility to the GODJ in May 2006.  The GODJ enlisted a private 
sector partner to manage the facility and, after that firm made a 
significant additional investment, the facility began operating in 
October 2006.  To date, 97% of the revenues for producers generated 
by exports from this site have gone to Somali and Ethiopian 
producers while only 3% have gone to Djiboutians.  The facility has 
generated over $15.0 million in revenue for the region.  As of 
August 2007, shippers have exported more than 620,000 sheep/goats, 
camel and cattle to Egypt, Yemen, Emirates and Saudi Arabia from 
this facility. 
 
¶6. (SBU) This $ 6.2 million USAID investment, now a public/private 
partnership with the GODJ, has made it possible for Horn of Africa 
livestock exporters to resume large scale, legitimate (not smuggled) 
animal exports from the Horn of Africa to the Middle East after a 20 
year hiatus.  Middle Eastern nations' concerns over rift valley 
fever and other animal diseases repeatedly blocked legitimate trade 
over that period.  Under close scrutiny by Saudi and other buyers, 
and with good veterinary services and other controls, the quarantine 
facility has made possible exports that are producing a significant 
regional impact. 
 
---------------------- 
Food Security Strategy 
---------------------- 
 
¶7.  (SBU) USAID has facilitated the establishment of a food security 
forum (by Presidential decree) and the development of Djibouti's 
very first food security strategy, in an effort led by the Djibouti 
President's Advisor on food security.  USAID led a coordination 
effort with United Nations Organizations and the GODJ to develop a 
single strategy for the whole country.  This strategy will be 
instrumental in combating future famine and humanitarian crises in 
this food insecure country. 
 
-------- 
Food Aid 
-------- 
 
¶8.  (SBU) Since 2003, USAID /Djibouti has worked closely with World 
Food Program (WFP) to develop and operate a variety of activities 
that support vulnerable Djiboutians through rural Food for Work 
programs.  It has provided food for 47,000 drought victims and 
provided urban institutional feeding for HIV/AIDS and TB victims; it 
has fed nursing and pregnant mothers, malnourished children, and 
Somali and Ethiopian refugees in Djibouti based refugee camps.  In 
2003, USAID funded initial 4,000 Mts. of commodities valued at $3.3 
million. USAID funded food aid valued at $1 million in 2004; $1 
million in FY 05; $2 million in 2006 and $1.0 million in FY 2007. 
Commodities supplied include milled, bagged wheat flour, rice, 
edible oil, lentils, fortified wheat and dried peas. Two-thirds of 
the food goes to Djiboutians, and one-third to refugees in two 
camps.  These food stocks have made it possible for Djibouti and the 
refugees, to avoid starvation, though chronic malnutrition 
continues. 
 
DJIBOUTI 00001150  003 OF 003 
 
 
 
----------------------------- 
FFP Pre-positioning Warehouse 
----------------------------- 
 
¶9.  (SBU) Djibouti has replaced Dubai as the site of USG 
pre-positioned, emergency food relief stocks in the region.  Food 
for Peace (FFP) containerized food stored here can be moved quickly 
to respond to crises in the Horn of Africa and beyond.  The food aid 
is pre-positioned in a warehouse in Djibouti's new Duty Free Zone. 
A Bahrain based company, BMMI, won the bid to manage the program in 
Djibouti.  Djibouti's central location and modern port 
infrastructure will ensure that food aid can be provided quickly in 
an emergency to Ethiopia, Somalia, Kenya, and, if needed, more 
distant potential recipients, such as south-east Asia. 
 
¶10.  (SBU) COMMENT:  The USG investment in food security and famine 
relief programs in Djibouti is a USAID success story.  Dollars 
invested here are providing benefits now for Djibouti, for Somalia, 
and Ethiopia. Our program in Djibouti is likely to produce even 
greater returns as Djibouti becomes an increasingly important 
regional economic hub, and one set in a moderate, Muslim, free 
market, secular, and democratic state. END COMMENT. 
 
SYMINGTON