The Democratic Republic of the Congo faces an ongoing humanitarian crisis due to protracted conflict and political instability. While there was optimism during the 2003-2006 political transition, the eastern region remains unstable with ongoing violence and displacement of people. Agriculture and food security are largely neglected by the government despite high rates of malnutrition. Food imports have increased substantially while export crops receive little support. Building resilience among communities will be challenging given reliance on emergency aid and weak government institutions.

1. Addressing Nutrition, Health, Social and Political
Shocks: Dealing with Conflict and Migration –
Perspectives from the DRC
Prof. Em. Eric Tollens
K.U.Leuven, Faculty of Bioscience Engineering
Centre for Bio-Economics
Leuven
IFPRI 2020 Conference on Building Resilience
for Food and Nutrition Security
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, May 14-17, 2014

2. Introduction
 DRC faces a chronic humanitarian crisis and is still coming out of
protracted conflict in Central Africa
 Eastern DRC still not fully pacified
 20,000 MONUSCO troops still in the country, costing 1.3
billion$/year
 2003-2006: political transition towards a democratic government,
with the main rebel parties part of the government
 In a huge country like the DRC with large ethnic diversity, there is
likely to be always some place with localized internal conflict
 Land rights emerging as a main cause of such conflict, together
with mineral rights

3. During and Just After the Political Transition
 Great optimism during the transition
 Donors were very generous in providing short term emergency
/humanitarian aid with no particular conditionalities imposed
during the transition
 For such aid, multilateral (UN) institutions favored
 But after the transition, bilateral aid became dominant
 The transition from short term emergency/humaniatarian aid
towards longer term development aid is difficult, with aid
conditionalities emerging; the right mix of both is difficult
 Most of the migration is internal displacement (an estimated 1.7
million in 2012); recently a large influx of migrants from CAR

4. Coming out of Conflict and Political Transition
 Agriculture and food security are not priority issues; in fact agriculture is
grossly neglected with less than 2% of the government budget going to
it, despite Maputo
 Recently the budget for agriculture is increasing (3% for agriculture; 3%
for rural development) after signing the CAADP compact in 2012
 Most agricultural support provided by donors
 The security situation, consolidating the state (sovereignty expenditures
(presidency); the army, justice, democratic process, public finance) and
rehabilitating infrastructure priorities
 But institutions remain very weak (chronic state failure) and are
frequently put into question (lack of tradition)
 Food imports soar (over 1.3 billion $/year), especially because there is
no real foreign exchange constraint
 The DRC has many of the characteristics of an oil exporter because of
minerals and oil exports which are increasing rapidly

5.  Food imports are bulky and low quality, very cheap calorie rich
foods (cereals, animal protein, fats) such as kappa meat, offals,
layer chickens, buffalo meat (India), old stocks of rice and wheat
 Nutrition is not seen as a priority; is never mentioned as an issue
despite large under and malnutrition; eating enough calories is
the main challenge; health equally not seen as a priority
 In agriculture, quick gains through improved seeds, hand tools
and tractors dominate; agricultural research and extension and
rural finance not seen as a priority
 Rural feeder roads rehabilitation and maintenance a tremendous
challenge, absorbing large amounts of donor aid
 Agricultural statistics totally neglected (people do not eat data!),
but still everybody uses such (phantom) data

6.  The worst hunger and nutrition indicators (GH index, food security
indexes) in the world do not raise political alarms; nobody believes
these (foreign) indicators
 The MICS (Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey) sponsored by UNICEF,
USAID, WHO, etc. is the most important source of health, nutrition and
food security information
 Export crops which require longer term investments are neglected and
are not a government priority (as there is no real foreign exchange
constraint), e.g. large imports of palm oil
 Private sector investments in export crops, despite the huge potential,
are minimal because of investment risk (conflict, risk of expropriation,
unsure land tenure), the overall negative investment climate (cfr. Doing
Business index) and lack of infrastructure
 Rainforest deforestation and REDD+ emerging as critical issues,
requiring agricultural intensification

7. In Conclusion
 DRC faces one of the most complex and protracted humanitarian crises
in the world, particularly in the east and northeast of the country
 Chronic vulnerability to recurring shocks (armed groups, natural
disasters, epidemics, acute malnutrition) is a reality for much of the
population
 Building community resilience is a huge challenge, especially the
capacity building; what are the best practices?
 Communities reliance on humanitarian/emergency aid, especially in the
East of the country, prevents an easy transition to longer term durable
development
 The links between humanitarian and development sectors must be
strengthened; how to do this?
 Most donors are used to short-term responses to long term problems;
a longer term approach focused on building context-appropriate
community resilience against vulnerability is needed but proves difficult