Posted 26 August 1998
The Global Information and Early Warning System (GIEWS) aims to provide policy-makers and policy-analysts with the most up-to-date information available on all aspects of food supply and demand, warning of imminent food crises, so that timely interventions can be planned.
The GIEWS Web site provides up-to-date information on the system and its activities. It also offers on-line access to publications such as "Food Outlook" and "Foodcrops and Shortages", the "Sahel Report", the "Food Supply Situation and Crop Prospects in Sub-Saharan Africa", as well as Special Reports and Alerts for countries or sub-regions experiencing particular food supply difficulties. Some of these reports are distributed by e-mail.To subscribe or send an e-mail to giews1@fao.org. for further information on the GIEWS mailing lists. The GIEWS Web site also provides access to on-line databases on Africa which include information on food and agriculture for different countries (texts, maps, statistical data etc.).
For further information visit the GIEWS Web site
or contact: Mr. Abdur Rashid, Chief, Global Information and Early Warning
System, FAO Rome;
E - mail: giews1@fao.org;
Tel: (39) 6 5705 3099;
Fax: (39) 6 5705 4495.
One of several guidelines published under the Handbook Series for the Special Programme on Food Security (SPFS) of FAO, this guide (FAO, Rome, December 1997) is a useful resource for all those involved in the conduct of participatory results and constraints analysis under the SPFS.
The main objective of the SPFS is to help low income food deficit countries (LIFDCs) to improve their national food security, through rapid increases in productivity and food production and by reducing year-to-year variability in production, on an economically and environmentally sustainable basis. The underlying assumption is that in most LIFDCs viable and sustainable means of increasing food availability exist but are not realized because of a range of constraints that prevent farmers from responding to needs and opportunities. By working with farmers and other stakeholders to identify and resolve such constraints - whether they are of a technical, institutional or policy nature - and to demonstrate ways of increasing production, the SPFS should open the way for improved productivity and broader food access.
Constraints analysis is a methodology for identifying a critical path among all the actions potentially needed to create a conducive socio-economic environment for increasing farmers' productivity and incomes. This guide explains the purpose of the constraints analysis component of the SPFS as well as the basic approach and steps to be followed in its implementation. It includes four annexes which present tools useful for carrying out participatory constraints analysis:
To obtain a copy of the "Guide for the conduct of the constraints analysis component", contact the: Policy Assistance Division in FAO, Viale delle Terme di Caracalla, 00100 Rome, Italy.
For further information on the Special Programme on Food Security contact the: Special Programme for Food Security, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), Viale delle Terme di Caracalla, 00100 Rome, Italy, e-mail : SPFS@fao.org