Food aid targeting in Ethiopia - A study of who needs it and who gets it

The need for systematic, empirical analysis of food aid targeting and impacts is overwhelming, especially given the large numbers of people concerned and volume of funds allocated to the problem of feeding Ethiopia's food insecure. This research examines the efficiency of food aid targeting in rural Ethiopia based on empirical evidence from a nationally representative survey of 4166 farm households. A key finding of the study is that there is no significant association between household food insecurity (vulnerability) and food aid receipts-a result of high errors of exclusion and inclusion at both the wereda and household levels. Four factors are identified as causes of the high level of targeting error: (1) the primary beneficiaries of food aid programs are found to be households at the extremes in terms of food availability: those with the least and those with the most food available; (2) a disproportionate number of female and aged heads of households received food aid, irrespective of their food needs; (3) an inability of the food aid system to reach households outside of the historically deficit areas; and (4) a disproportionate concentration of food aid in the region of Tigray. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.