Voting With Their Feet

Food deprivation in Iraq EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Seven out of every 100 Iraqi individuals are undernourished. This is equivalent to an estimated 2.1 million Iraqis. In light of the history of conflict in Iraq and the current state of instability, this prevalence is rather low especially when compared to the overall prevalence of food deprivation within the Near East and North Africa region (7 percent in Iraq compared to 8 percent in the region).

The national prevalence, however, is not equally distributed at the sub national level as disparities exist between the Iraqi governorates. Although food insecure households exist in nearly all governorates of Iraq, they are found to be concentrated in Diyala, Babylon Basrah, Salah al Deen, Kerbala and Muthanna governorates where the prevalence of food deprivation ranges from 51 to 17 percent. The highest level of food deprivation is observed in Diyala governorate, where around one half of people were food deprived. The high prevalence of food deprivation in Diyala is attributed to disruptions in food distributions through the Public Distribution System caused by the incidence of violence and military campaigns during the data collection period.

The Public Distribution System (PDS) was established in 1991 to guarantee a provision of a minimum consumption needs to the Iraqi population through distribution of rations comprising of wheat flour, rice, sugar, vegetable oil, pulses, adult milk, infant formula and tea as well as other non food items at a highly subsidized price. The average daily dietary energy consumption in Iraq is 2580 kilocalorie per person, over half of which is acquired through the PDS.

At the level of household characteristics, food deprivation is concentrated within population groups characterized by low income, large households, whose head is over 50 years of age and is illiterate, involved in agricultural activities or unemployed.

Expenditures on food represents slightly more than one third (35 percent) of total household expenditures, of which, 80 percent is dedicated to commercial food purchases and the remaining twenty percent represents the value of the nominal payment required to receive the PDS food rations, the value of food produced and consumed by households and food purchased and consumed away from the home.

Despite having a share of 80 percent of all food expenditures, food purchased from the commercial markets provides only 44 percent of the kilocalorie consumption at the national level. Accordingly, the contribution of dietary energy from the PDS plays a critical role from the food security perspective while the contribution of purchased food plays an important role from the expenditure structure perspective and dietary energy acquired from food from own production is negligible. The high reliance of Iraqis within the lower income strata on food rations renders them vulnerable to any irregularities in the distribution system and market fluctuations.

The market price of 1000 kilocalories in Iraq is valued at 610 Iraqi Dinars on average. Accordingly, daily per capita expenditure on food is valued at 1590 Iraqi Dinars. When accounting for actual expenditures, subsidized prices of food provided through the PDS renders the cost of 1000 kilocalories to be 520 Iraqi Dinars on average, bringing daily per capita out of pocket expenditure on food down to 1360 Iraqi Dinars.

In general, the Iraqi diet is balanced from the perspective of macro nutrient consumption as the distribution of energy acquired from fat, carbohydrates and proteins is 26, 62 and 12 percent respectively. However, consumption of fat is nearer to the higher bounds and protein nearer the lower bounds of the FAO/WHO/UNU recommendations. Average daily cereal consumption of around 400 grams per person provides 53 percent of total dietary energy consumed, followed by oils and fats (12 percent) and sugar (11 percent).

Animal protein (meat, dairy products, eggs and fish) contributes 10 percent to the total dietary energy consumption. Food consumption is not equally distributed amongst all Iraqi households, as households of higher income group consume on average twice the quantity of dietary energy than that consumed by households in the lowest income group. Inequality in total expenditures is higher than food consumption inequality as total expenditures in the lowest income group is seven times less than that of the highest income group.

Source: ReliefWeb » Document » Food deprivation in Iraq

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Iraqi refugees regret going home, UNHCR survey finds | Reuters

GENEVA (Reuters) – A majority of Iraqi refugees who have returned from exile to Baghdad regret their decision, saying they face insecurity, a lack of jobs and inadequate health care, the United Nations refugee agency said on Tuesday.

Some 61 percent of those interviewed were sorry they had left Syria and Jordan, while one in three was unsure of staying in Iraq, according to its recently-completed survey of 2,353 Iraqis who returned to the capital between 2007 and 2008.

"UNHCR staff were informed by returnees of numerous instances of explosions, harassment, military operations and kidnapping occurring in their areas of return," Melissa Fleming, spokeswoman of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), told a news briefing.

Although many returnees said they had left their host countries because they could no longer afford the cost of living there, some 87 percent said their income in Iraq was insufficient to cover their families’ needs.

"One of the principal challenges we found for Iraqi returnees is finding regular employment, making them reliant on irregular jobs, which are often not available," Fleming said.

Separate polls of a total of 3,500 Iraqi refugees living in Syria and Jordan, released on October 8, found most still reluctant to return home on a permanent basis, according to the UNHCR.

Refugees cited political uncertainty and insecurity in Iraq, as well as poor educational opportunities and housing shortages. Syria and Jordan host some 180,000 registered Iraqi refugees.

FORCED DEPORTATIONS

While violence has plunged from the height of sectarian bloodshed in 2006-2007, explosions and attacks happen daily. Bombs destroyed the home of a senior Iraqi police commander on Tuesday, killing at least 11 people in the northern city of Tikrit, hometown of former dictator Saddam Hussein, police said.

The UNHCR does not promote returns to Iraq, due to insecurity, and its guidelines to all governments strongly recommend that Iraqis should not be sent home to five central provinces, including Baghdad, seen as too dangerous.

However, it helps refugees who voluntarily want to go home, providing them with transport costs and a small cash grant.

Fewer than 3,000 have taken up the offer since 2007, though many have returned without its support, according to the agency.

"Iraqi refugees are the best judges of when to go back. Basically they are voting with their feet," said UNHCR spokeswoman Sybella Wilkes.

The UNHCR also said that it remained concerned by forced deportations of failed Iraqi asylum seekers from five countries in Europe (Britain, Denmark, Netherlands, Norway and Sweden).

It knew of seven chartered flights, coordinated by the European Union border agency FRONTEX, believed to have flown several hundred Iraqis back to their homeland since June.

"We would very much like to have a fuller picture of who is being returned and where," Wilkes said. "We hear from various countries that they plan to continue returns but we don’t know when."

Source: Iraqi refugees regret going home, UNHCR survey finds | By Stephanie Nebehay | Reuters