The Food Security Cluster (FSC) Preparedness and Resilience Working Group (PRWG) launched a call for good practices on preparedness and resilience-building approaches and activities among its partners.

Mercy Corps' Pastoralist Areas Resilience Improvement through Market Expansion (PRIME) project is a five-year project which focused on selected districts of Ethiopia’s Afar, Oromiya and Somali regions. The project sought to build resilience to drought-induced animal mortality by facilitating market systems development. 

In Ethiopia, recurrent droughts exacerbate food insecurity by causing chronic food shortages, livestock mortality, and conflict over scarce natural resources. The near failure of three consecutive rainy seasons (Guu, Karan and the following Guu rains) in 2015-16 resulted in drought and massive displacement of pastoralists in search of pasture and water. Livestock suffered stress and their susceptibility to serious diseases, like internal and external parasites, increased. An evaluation of four heavily drought affected woredas in Fafan Zone in Somali Region revealed that short- and long-term activities had effectively enabled households to quickly recover, maintain or improve key food security measures in the face of drought. The multi-year and flexible funding along with an integrated approaches were important factors for resilience-building of pastoralist communities.

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