Namibia Country Strategic Plan (2017-2024)

Country Strategic Plan approved EB June 2017.

Revision 02 approved by the ED in November 2018.

Revision 03 approved by the CD in October 2019.

Revision 04 approved by the CD in December 2019.

Revision 05 approved by the EB in December 2021.

Revision 06 approved by the RD in June 2023.

Namibia is an upper-middle-income country with a population of 2.1 million  people and ranking 125  of the 188 countries in the United Nations Development Programme Human Development Index for 2016. An estimated 42.3 percent of the population is undernourished  as a result of high rates of poverty, which currently stands at 18 percent,  unemployment at 34 percent  and HIV at 17 percent  and high household income disparities. The 2016 Global Hunger Index classified Namibia as having a “serious food problem”.

In spite of sustained macroeconomic progress over the years, the Gini coefficient of 0.572 shows that Namibia is one of the world’s most unequal countries.  Insufficient food production and reliance on external markets for food – 60 percent of cereal needs are imported each year – suggest that poor households are particularly vulnerable to food price fluctuations.

Development in Namibia is guided by the Vision 2030 initiative, the Fifth National Development Plan, the zero hunger strategic review and the recent Harambee Prosperity Plan, which all recognize the importance of food and nutrition security and support the Zero Hunger initiative in contributing to Namibia’s drive to achieve Sustainable Development Goals 2 and 17. The Namibia zero hunger strategic review identified challenges to achieving zero hunger: lack of policy coherence with policies and social programmes being largely sectoral and fragmented; weak coordination between and within ministries and with private sector; technical and managerial capacity constraints at both the national and regional levels; and weak and fragmented monitoring and evaluation systems.

This country strategic plan is aligned with the Government’s priorities, focusing on enhanced upper-tier technical assistance and knowledge transfer that is demand-driven and directed towards two strategic outcomes:

• Strategic outcome 1: Vulnerable populations in Namibia are enabled to meet their food and nutrition needs throughout the year.
• Strategic outcome 2: Government policy dialogue and programme design in Namibia are informed by enhanced evidence and knowledge of hunger issues throughout the National Development Plan 5 period. 

The country strategic plan consolidates WFP’s role as a technical partner to the Government with a view to facilitating the development and transfer of knowledge and maintaining capacities to supplement government food security and nutrition programmes