South Sudan—Resilience through Agriculture in South Sudan (RASS) Activity

South Sudan’s rural areas have poor infrastructure, limited health and education services, weak institutions and human capacity, and a nascent private sector. Largely outside the formal economy, livelihoods are resource-based and often insufficient to enable households to sustain and recover reoccurring shocks and stresses and break out of poverty. Extended periods of intense conflict for more than 40 years have weakened social cohesion, eroded trust within and between communities, and resulted in significant levels of trauma and gender-based violence.

The Resilience through Agriculture in South Sudan (RASS) Activity has been designed to improve food security and community household recovery and resilience in 13 target counties in South Sudan, reducing their long-term reliance on humanitarian assistance.

RASS works to improve the effectiveness of local systems and strengthen the capacities of community groups to achieve gender-responsive and diversified market-sensitive production; facilitate the production of diverse, nutritious foods by strengthening productivity, reducing food loss, and improving nutrition behaviors; and expand household and community opportunities for sustainable, locally driven livelihoods. Taken together, these activities will help graduate communities from crisis, emergency, and famine to less acute phases of food insecurity, and ultimately support a transition from reliance on humanitarian assistance to development and economic growth.

RASS strengthens capacities to sustain gender-responsive, diversified, and market-sensitive agricultural production; increase the availability of, access to, and utilization of diverse, safe, and affordable diet; and expand opportunities for sustainable, locally driven livelihoods, thereby graduating communities from emergency to insecure. Interventions to date have resulted in an 18 percent rise in the Food Consumption Score of program participants in the “acceptable” category, rising from 15 percent to 33 percent while those in the “poor” category reduced from 65 percent to 40 percent.

Sample Activities

• Provide grants to local institutions, including producer groups, women and youth associations, and micro, small, and medium-sized enterprise to build their capacity.
• Promote forage and animal feed production.
• Improve linkage between farmers and input suppliers.
• Promote diversified and nutrient-rich crop production.
• Expand opportunities for sustainable, locally driven livelihoods.
• Expand access to financial services to diversify livelihoods and protect productive assets.

Select Results

• Reached 62,156 program participants (54.2 percent women and 26.4 percent young people) with improved technologies, management practices, small firms, alternative livelihood activities, and social behavior change messaging. Of the total program participants, 23,298 are farmers in 768 farmer groups engaging in field crops, vegetables, and community-based seed production. 
• Helped participants engage in farming and other businesses to realize $ 2,409,911 in sales of their field crops, vegetables, livestock, fish, honey products, shea products, energy-saving stoves, sewn apparel, soap, and more.
• Trained 3,838 smallholder ruminant and non-ruminant livestock farmers on good animal husbandry practices.
• Reached 14,737 children under the age of 5 with nutrition-specific interventions which included the provision of nutrients and training of their mothers and caregivers on nutrition and good hygiene practices.
• Organized and supported 4,526 program participants from 176 village savings and loans associations—improving access to finance in communities underserved by formal financial institutions and developing a savings and lending culture.
• Reached 7,079 program participants and 304,000 non-participant mobile phone subscribers with key messages promoting positive masculinity, youth engagement in agriculture, and shared decision-making within households through social behavior change campaigns to address harmful societal norms and promote positive behaviors.
• Increased the autonomy of female participants in agriculture-related decision-making by 19 percent, increasing from 34 percent to 53 percent. In addition, 15 percent of the surveyed participants, male and female, reported increased asset ownership, indicating positive progress.