‘Nobody should have to risk their life for food’
A smartphone app created by WFP in Somalia to deliver food assistance, might now be saving lives during the coronavirus pandemic
Empty shelves in local supermarkets around the world were one of the visible signs of the gravity of COVID-19. While panic often drives people to hoard supplies, the wide use of online delivery apps has sheltered many from shortages.
But for communities where fear of hunger was already present before the pandemic, empty shelves can feel like a living nightmare. It is in countries such as Somalia —already hit by conflict, food insecurity and under-resourced public health systems — where people are most vulnerable to the virus and its multiple effects, including empty shelves.
Responding to food insecurity, amid a pandemic
A coronavirus outbreak in Somalia — where cases have recently spiked, reaching 1,573— can easily exacerbate the fragile food security situation in the country.
The World Food Programme (WFP), which was on the front lines of the Ebola crisis in West Africa in 2014, had to respond immediately. But COVID-19 brings a unique dilemma to WFP cash operations: we have to ensure food is accessible in local markets and people are fed, while keeping them inside their homes.
Step 1: Securing food in the markets
Only once it is certain food is accessible in markets, can WFP then leverage their technological innovations to help keep people inside. In simplest terms: food has to be in shops, and those shops have to be open, for WFP to use cash assistance.
As a first measure, WFP updates rapid market assessments across Somalia weekly to monitor and mitigate the effects of temporary border closures and restrictions on local food supply chains. Recent findings show that prices of key food commodities began to increase due to panic buying, the lock-down imposed on some key source markets outside Somalia, floods that rendered major roads impassable for transporters and high transportation costs.
For Somalia, an import-dependent country, this may be one of the greatest threats COVID-19 poses.
WFP met commercial retailers and importers in the country to understand how their local capacity to supply food might be impacted. As teammates in their emergency response plan, WFP also helped prepare them to stay in business with these new market challenges.
Step 2: Making staying home an option for everyone
In the town of Baidoa in Southern Somalia, a local shop displays COVID-19 communication posters. Slogans like “Avoid long lines and crowded places,” and, “Minimize congestion in public transit” meet customers in the checkout line. It seems today marketing is the same around the world.
The posters are part of WFP’s home delivery campaign to promote the new universal guidelines: keep your distance.
With the E-shop smartphone app, vulnerable families near functioning markets in Somalia can redeem their WFP cash assistance online, even from their homes. They fill a shopping cart of products offered at their local grocery store contracted by WFP, select home delivery option, and check-out.
The app is giving opportunities to local businesses during a fragile time for livelihoods, and the economy.
Local retailers — who have 2–3 months of buffer stock for the uncertain future — receive the purchase orders through the E-shop app. Local transporters then collect the goods from the small shops and deliver direct to families homes. This process from app to door takes no more than three to seven days.
Somalia has seen a rise in digital businesses in its emerging e-commerce market in recent years. E-Shop plays to that demand. The app was created in 2018 to give people receiving food assistance the same shopping experience that is evolving globally, as the age of technology reinvents our idea of convenience. And in the parts of Somalia where conflict and violence are a constant walking outside, E-shop became a protection measure too.
A new form of assistance
COVID-19 is reshaping societies with new restrictions on life. Stay inside, wash your hands, keep your distance — these are instructions across most of the world and Somalia is no exception. But it’s more complicated, risky even, for vulnerable populations: How do you stay inside when your life depends on receiving food assistance outside?
With WFP’s E-shop app, vulnerable families in Somalia don’t have to ask themselves that question. Instead, they have the option to receive their assistance from local retailers at home, because nobody should have to risk their life for food.
Learn more about WFP’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
