Gambia, The
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WFP assistance to the Gambia started in 1970 with the community-based school feeding
project, which lasted until 1994 with five expansion phases with an annual average of 611,000 children fed by WFP. The School feeding Programme followed with a strategy of enabling development through food for education and has helped increase enrolment and attendance in primary schools and ECD centers by 23 percent. The current project runs for a four year period and began in August 2007 ending in July 2011. This will be to support Basic education in rural vulnerable region and in the longer term, WFP will support the Gambia in achieving the EFA/MDG 2 targets by ensuring that all boys and girls complete a full course of primary schooling by 2015.The total number of beneficiaries is 119,00 for each year of the project.
As well the Gambia Country Office run the Emergency Operation (EMOP) as a result of fighting which escalated between the Senegalese Army and the Casamance separatist rebels in the southern part of Senegal .Currently, all refugees are being hosted in Gambian households in 56 villages located in the Foni Districts of the Western Region with a planned beneficiary figure of 7,000.
The Gambia, a country of 11,295 km2 with a population of 1.4 million,3 is bordered by
Senegal except on the Atlantic coast. High annual population growth - 4.2 percent in 2001 and its small size give the Gambia a demographic density of 133/km2, one of the highest in sub-Saharan Africa. The population is predominantly Muslim; 63.6 percent are
under 25. Poverty is widespread and concentrated in rural areas. Recent statistics indicate that 69 percent of the population is living below the poverty line.
The Gambia, a least developed low-income food-deficit country, ranks 155th of 177 countries in the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Human Development Index. Poverty is widespread and concentrated in rural areas and recent statistics indicate that 69 percent of the populations are living below the poverty line.
Almost all transportation is via the road network. The country is served mainly by two major roads that is the one via the North Bank and the other via the South. There is a ferry crossing between Banjul and Barra which provides access to the North Bank Region. The road network from the North bank has recently been built and is in a very good state encouraging many road transport users to take this route and also to reach the south part of the country. During dispatches to schools by WFP contracted trucks, the North Bank road is mainly used to transport approximately 3531 metric tons of food rations using over 200 truckloads. More than half of the rations being transported to the schools use the North Bank roads via the ferry crossing to reach the assisted schools due to the better road conditions.
For rations going to schools along the south bank and to the distribution sites for the refugees, the south bank road must be used, which take much longer to deliver the rations with greater risk of vehicle breakdown during the journey due to unpaved roads along with large potholes.. Over 1,200mt was deliver to the 10 refugees' distributions sites using more than 25 truck loads.
