EC/FAO Programme on Information Systems to Improve Food Security Decision-Making in the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) East Area

Training on “Food Balance Sheet (FBS) – A tool for policy analysis and decision-making”

State Statistical Committee, Baku, Azerbaijan

5 – 7 November 2012 1. Background

A three day training was organized during 5-7 November 2012 on “Food Balance Sheet (FBS) – A tool for policy analysis and decision-making” by the State Statistical Committee (SSC), with support from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) under the “EC/FAO Programme on Information Systems to Improve Food Security Decision-Making in the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) East Area”. The Programme is funded by the European Commission (EC) and implemented by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). The Programme aims at improving food security by enhancing the national capacity to generate, analyse, communicate and mainstream more relevant and reliable information into policies and programmes.

The training is one of the activities of the EC/FAO Programme in Azerbaijan, Moldova and Armenia under the “Improving Food Balance Sheet” Component. Other activities under this component in Azerbaijan consisted in:

• one day user-producer workshop to present FAO findings and recommendations to improve the reliability and accuracy of Food Balance Sheets (FBS) (Baku, May 2011);

• in-depth assessment of FBS in Azerbaijan (Baku, September 2011 and May 2012);

• five-day study tour to Lithuania for both FBS users and producers to learn the experience of Lithuanian colleagues in compiling Food Balance Sheet and in using it to support policy development and analysis (Vilnius, November 2011).

• Five-day training for FBS producers on the methodological concepts of Supply Utilization Accounts and Food Balance Sheet (Rome, December 2011);

• in-country coaching support (Baku, May and July 2012);

• Letter of Agreement (LoA) with the Main Computing Centre (MCC) at the SCC for provision of a “Web user interface of Food Balance Sheet, including an integrated metadata system for public use on the SSC website”, September 2012 – March 2013.

Food balance sheets (FBS) are invaluable tools for governments, planners, researchers and international

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organizations, as they provide a sound basis to support policy analysis and decision- making in the area of agriculture, food security and nutrition. FBS present a comprehensive picture of the pattern of a country’s food supply and utilization during a specified reference period. Annual food balance sheets tabulated regularly over a period of years show the trends in the overall national food supply, disclose changes that may have taken place in the types of food consumed, i.e. the pattern of the diet, and show whether a nation as a whole is moving towards meeting national dietary requirements.

FBS are also useful for estimating the overall shortages and surpluses of agricultural products in a country, developing projections of future food supply and demand, setting targets for agricultural production, establishing relationships between national food supplies, famine and malnutrition as well as for evaluating national food and nutrition policies. FBS allow the calculation of indicators which provide important information on the state of the agricultural economy. For example, a comparison of the quantities of food available for human consumption with those imported will indicate the extent to which a country depends upon imports (import dependency ratio) to feed itself and trends. The amount of food crops used for feeding livestock in relation to total crop production indicates the degree to which primary food resources are used to produce animal feed which is useful information for analyzing livestock policies or patterns of agriculture.

2. Objective of the training

The objective of the training was to introduce FBS as an instrument for policy analysis and decision- making. It gave participants hands-on experience of the use of FBS and its elements to monitor and analyze the food situation in the country, with the objective of supporting decision-making processes on issues related to food and nutrition security, including import requirements, formation of food stocks and social safety net.

The training was organized in a way to allow exploring all main potential uses of FBS to support policy-making. Participants acquired sufficient knowledge and skills to analyze the trends of the main FBS variables (production, imports, consumption, etc.), calculate different indicators (self-sufficiency, import dependency, etc.) and identify relevant policy options and interventions.

The agenda of the training is provided in Annex 1.

3. Participation

The training was attended by 20 participants from government institutions - Ministry of Economic Development, Ministry of Agriculture, Ministry of Health, Ministry of Labour and Social Protection of Population and State Statistical Committee.

The list of participants is provided in Annex 2.

4. Trainers

The training was conducted by two FAO staff:

• Guljahan Kurbanova, Global Information and Early Warning System (GIEWS), Trade and Markets Division, Regional Office for Europe and Central Asia (REU)

• Onno Hoffmeister, Statistics Division, FAO Headquarters

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5. Process

Day 1

The participants were welcomed by Hamid Bagirov, First Deputy Chairman of SSC and Rasmiyya Aliyeva, Programme Country Coordinator, Azerbaijan. Hamid Bagirov highlighted the importance of FBS for policy-making in agriculture and development in general. Rasmiyya Aliyeva introduced the training. She explained that this training was organized because FBS are an important tool to analyze, monitor and predict the situation of food security and that this tool is often underutilized or even misused in countries to support decision-making processes. She delivered also information on Programme activities related to FBS component.

All participants then introduced themselves, providing information on their institution and functions.

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The keynote speech was delivered by Guljahan Kurbanova. She reviewed the food security and nutrition situation at global, regional and country levels, the main factors affecting the evolution of the situation, including food prices, and the trends and challenges ahead.

The training sessions were divided into three blocks. Block 1 aimed at deepening understanding of FBS (second half of Day 1&Morning session of Day 2), Block 2 at explaining the differences between the methodologies applied by SCC, FAO and Eurostat (Day 2) and Block 3 was devoted to FBS applications (second half of Day 2 and Day 3).

The training was facilitated by the Country Coordinator. All presentations were followed by a discussion between the trainers and participants. Practical exercises were carried out to help participants apply new learning. A quiz was carried out at the end of Day 2 to check knowledge acquisition, giving an opportunity to refocus on the most problematic issues. Work group was organized on the last day to analyze the vulnerability of Azerbaijan, based on FBS, and come up with policy recommendations.

The afternoon of Day 1 was devoted to a series of presentations which explained what FBS are about and how they are being constructed (Block 1: Understanding FBS), which were continued during first half of second day:

• What is a Food Balance Sheet? – Basic Outline, principles and indicators

• Treatment of Intermediate Production and the Concept of Standardization

• Characteristics and Implications of Integrated Data Sets

• What means “food availability” in FBS?

• Main Indicators of FBS for Economic Analyses Each presentation was followed by lively discussions, during which the participants received answers to their questions and additional explanations on issues more relevant to their specific to interests. With the assistance of the trainers, they carried out exercises specially designed for country-specific circumstances.

Day 2

The second day started with a summary of what was learned during the previous day and the presentation of the objectives and agenda of the day.

The first part of the day was devoted to the second part of Block 1: Understanding FBS and then to the comparison of the methodologies used by SSC, FAO and Eurostat, clarifying the different concepts leading to different results (Block 2: Comparison of Methodologies). The following presentations were delivered:

• FAO methodology on FBS

• Eurostat’s Supply Balance Sheet

• FBS in Azerbaijan The presentation on FBS in Azerbaijan was delivered by Alisa Zeynalli, Head of Food Security and

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Balances Division at the SSC. He presented the main functions of the SSC, legislative basis, principles for the development of statistical programmes, harmonization with the European Codex on Statistical Norms, structure and principles of FBS compilation and data sources for FBS compilation. He also explained the improvements made in response to FAO recommendations in the context of the EC/FAO Programme, in particular streamlining data collection for FBS and harmonizing national FBS and Household Budget Survey (HBS). Additional efforts are being made to increase the accessibility of FBS data by the users through a Letter of Agreement between FAO and SSC in September 2012 for the development of a web interactive user interface on the SSC website. The launching of the interface is expected to be a major improvement for FBS users in terms of accessibility, clarity and transparency through the dissemination of all FBS data and indicators of Azerbaijan as well as related metadata. The presentation also focused on the on-going work towards harmonization of FAOSTAT and national statistics. Despite significant progress some differences remain and are expected to remain as FAO use standard methodologies and sources of data which are not those used by the country (for instance FAO use UN population data and SSC use national population data). The presentations of FBS applications (Block 3: FBS Applications) started in the afternoon of Day 2. This was the session most focused on the actual problem areas on which the FBS users work. Each presentation was followed by an active discussion between the participants and with the trainers. Presentations of the Block 3 (Day 2&3) were the following:

• FBS as a source for forecasting

• Food and Nutrition Assessment Based on FBS

• Impact Assessment and Vulnerability Analysis by National Actors Using FBS Day 3 The third day started with a summary of the main issues discussed during the previous day and the presentation of the objectives and agenda of the day.

The afternoon was then devoted to the joint analysis of the Quiz results, a discussion round and a wrap up session. The questions of the quiz that led to the highest number of incorrect answers were discussed, and the trainers provided the correct answers with required explanations to the participants.

The discussion round focused on the following questions, when participants were divided into 2 groups:

• How can I use FBS in my job? The institutions represented in the training explained the importance of FBS for their institution. MoA stressed the use of FBS to monitor the implementation of the agricultural strategy. The Ministry of Economic Development and Ministry of Labour and Social Protection of Population said that they plan to use FBS for food security and vulnerability analyses, as well as targeted social protection measures and infrastructure development. The Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Economic Development stressed that before the training the FBS were not used by the staff so far but that the training allowed them to understand the potential of the tool for their daily work.

• What are their limitations? The limitation of FBS for targeting individuals, households or groups of people, as well as broad group of commodities was mentioned. Users also expressed a wish for increased harmonization of the FBS published by different institutions.

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• What do I need in addition to FBS to analyze food security? Participants stressed the importance of other information to better understand the dynamics of food security in all its dimensions. It was proposed to organize more workshops similar to to the present one to maintain the efficient exchange of information and views between FBS producers and users.

The discussion round was followed by a wrap up session. Ms Kurbanova summarized the results of the training and reviewed the expectations of the training against the results. She concluded that expectations had been met to a large extent. She hoped that the training had contributed to the promotion of evidence-based policies and that participants will effectively apply what they have learned in performing their work after the training. The participants received a certificate and were asked to fill an evaluation form.

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6. Follow-up activities

The training for FBS users was one of activities planned under the “Improving FBS” component of the Programme in Azerbaijan. The development of the Web user interface of Food Balance Sheetis planned to be finalized by March 2013. A final workshop will be organized tentatively in April 2013 with the participation of both FBS users and producers from the three countries that have given priority to FBS under the Country Workplans of the Programme (Azerbaijan, Moldova and Armenia). The objective of the workshop is to review the work being carried out under the Programme to improve FBS and discuss plans for the future cooperation.

In the meantime, FAO will continue to provide support to finalize the implementation of FAO recommendations.

7. Evaluation of the training

The information provided by the participants in the evaluation form that they were asked to fill at the end of the training confirmed their satisfaction with the content of the course, the methods used to deliver the course, the training materials and the organization. The evaluation form is provided in Annex 3 and the results are analyzed in Annex 4.

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Annex 1.

EC/FAO Programme on Information Systems to Improve Food Security Decision-Making in the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) East Area

Training: “Food Balance Sheets - A Tool for Policy Analysis and Decision-Making”

State Statistical Committee (SSC), Baku, Azerbaijan

5-7 November 2012

AGENDA

Monday 5 November 2012

09:30 – 10:00 Registration

OPENING SESSION

10:00 – 11:30 Welcome Note by:

• Mr Hamid Bagirov, First Deputy Chairman of SSC • Ms Rasmiyya Aliyeva, Country Coordinator, Azerbaijan

Participants introduce themselves

11:30 – 11:45 Coffee break

11:45 -13:00 Keynote speech: Review of Global Food Security (Guljahan KURBANOVA) Questions and answers

13:00 – 14:00 Lunch

Block I: Understanding FBS

14:00 – 14:15 What is a Food Balance Sheet? – Basic Outline, Principles and Indicators (Onno Hoffmeister)

14:15 – 15:15 The Treatment of Intermediate Production and the Concept of Standardization (Onno Hoffmeister)

15:15 – 15:45 Questions and answers

15:45 – 16:15 Coffee break

16:15-17:00 Practical exercises on Block I

Tuesday 6 November 2012

9:00-9:15 Summary of what was learned in the previous day and objectives of the day

9:15-10:00 Main Indicators of FBS for Economic Analyses (Guljahan Kurbanova) Discussions

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10:00 – 10:30 Coffee break

10:30 – 11:00 The FBS Cake is Baked from Different Data – Characteristics and Implications of Integrated Data Sets (Onno Hoffmeister)

11:00 – 11:45 Food Availability in the FBS – What Does It Exactly Mean? (Onno Hoffmeister) Questions and answers

Block II: Comparative Session

11:45 – 12:30 The FAO Methodology on FBS (Guljahan Kurbanova & Onno Hoffmeister)

12:30 – 13:00 Eurostat’s Supply Balance Sheets (Onno Hoffmeister)

13:00 – 14:00 Lunch

14:00 – 15:00 The FBS of Azerbaijan (Alisa Zeynalli, Head of Food Security and Balances Division, SSC) Questions and answers

15:00-15:30 Practical exercises on Block II

Block III: FBS Applications

15:30-15:45 FBS as a Source for Forecasting (Guljahan Kurbanova)

15:45-16:00 FBS Quiz

Wednesday 7 November 2012

9:00-9:15 Summary of what was learned in the previous day and objectives of the day

9:15-9:45 Food and Nutrition Assessment Based on FBS (Guljahan KURBANOVA)

9:45-10:30 Case study

10:30-11:00 Coffee break

11:00-12:00 Impact Assessment and Vulnerability Analysis by National Actors Using FBS (Guljahan KURBANOVA) Questions and answers

12:00 – 13:00 Practical exercises on Block III

13:00-14:00 Lunch break

13:00-13:30 Joint analysis of the Quiz results

Concluding Session

13:30-14:30 Discussion round: “How can I use FBS on my job? What are their limitations? What in addition would I need?”

14:30-15:00 Coffee break

15:00-16:00 Wrapping up – summary, open questions, and evaluation

16:00 Closure of the Training

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Annex 2. List of participants

# Name Position e-mail 1 Hamid Bagirov SSC, the first deputy chairman bagirov@azstat.org

2 Alkhan Mansurov SSC, Head of Department on Coordination of Statistical Works alkhan@azstat.org

3 Alisa Zeynalli SSC, Head of Food Security and balances department alisa@azstat.org

4 Khalil Qorchiyev SSC, Food Security and balances department, consultant khalilg@azstat.org

5 Malik Heydarov SSC, Deputy head of Agriculture and Environment Statistics malik@azstat.org

6 Alik Qurbanov SSC, Agriculture and Environment Statistics Department, Chief consultant alikg@azstat.org

7 Vugar Valiyev SSC, Agriculture and Environment Statistics Department, Chief consultant vugarv@azstat.org

8 Yashar Pasha SSC, Head of HBS Department yashar@azstat.org

9 Nail İmanov SSC, Deputy head of HBS Department naili@azstat.org

10 Kamal Panahov SSC, Main Computing Centre kamal@azstat.org

11 Nizami Mammadov

Ministry of Labour and Social Protection of Population (MoLSPP), head of Section on analyses of living conditions nmammadov@mlspp.gov.az

12 Matlab Asgarov MoLSPP, Living conditions and aktuar calculations department, consultant askerov-75@mail.ru

13 Umidvar Jafarov MoLSPP, State Social Protection Service, leading consultant

14 Gunel Aliyeva MoLSPP, Living conditions and aktuar calculations department, consultant gunel-m@rambler.ru

15 Lala Safaraliyeva Ministry of Economy Development (MoED), Department of Strategic planning, consultant

16 Sevda İmamverdiyeva MoED, Department of Strategic planning, consultant sevdaimamverdiyeva@gmail.com

17 Rukhsara Vezirova MoED, Department of Economic policy, analysis and forecasting, Chief consultant

18 Namiq Shalbuzov MoA, IEOA, Head of Farm Data Unit n.shalbuzov@mail.ru

19 Ramil Huseyn IEOA, Deputy head of FDU ramilhuseyn@box.az

20 Elshan Zeynalov IEOA, chief economist elshen-seynalov@mail.ru

21 Zohrab Quliyev Ministry of Health, Republican Centre of Hygiene and Epidemiology, doctor

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Annex 3. Evaluation form

Training: “Food Balance Sheets - A Tool for Policy Analysis and Decision-Making” (5-7 November, 2012, Baku, Azerbaijan)

Training Evaluation Form

Please indicate your opinion about each section of the training course by circling the appropriate number:

1 = not at all 2 = not much 3 = to some extent 4 = mostly 5 = completely

I. PARTICIPANT’S LEARNING OBJECTIVES

1. Were the learning objectives clear and precise? 1 2 3 4 5

2. Were the following learning objectives of the training course attained?

• Introduction of FBS: 1 2 3 4 5

• Present the different FBS methodologies (FAO, EUROSTAT, other), their advantages and

limitations: 1 2 3 4 5

• Clarify how FBS can be used for economic analyses, forecasts and policy-making: 1 2 3 4 5

II. CONTENTS OF THE TRAINING COURSE

3. Was the content relevant to the objectives? 1 2 3 4 5

4. Was the content well structured? 1 2 3 4 5

5. Was the content presented clearly? 1 2 3 4 5

6. Will this training course help you in your job? 1 2 3 4 5 Please explain……………………………………….…………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………………………………………..

………………………………………………………………………………………………….. III. METHODS

7. Were the methods used for the training appropriate to reach the objectives? 1 2 3 4 5 8. Efficiency (time use): 1 2 3 4 5

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9. How useful did you find the following methods used during the training course?

• PowerPoint Presentations: 1 2 3 4 5

• Presentations/information delivered by other participants: 1 2 3 4 5 • Practical exercises and case studies: 1 2 3 4 5

• Facilitated discussions: 1 2 3 4 5

Please provide suggestions for improving the methods: ……………………………………….……………………………………………………..…

…………………………………………………………………………………………………..

…………………………………………………………………………………………………..

IV. GENERAL AND OTHER

10. How efficient was the organizational aspect of the training (venue, equipment, breaks, etc.)?

1 2 3 4 5 11. How useful were the reference documents in your folders: 1 2 3 4 5 12. Are the experts enough competent on the topics from the agenda: 1 2 3 4 5

Recommendations: …………………………………….……………………………………………………..……

………………………………………………………………………………………………..…

Date: ………………………

Name (optional)

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Annex 4: Results of the Evaluation The questionnaire was filled by 15 participants of the workshop. The results of the evaluation, based on the answers of these respondents, are presented below.

Overall, the respondents positively assessed the training. For almost all questions in the evaluation form the participants selected either the highest (“completely satisfied”), or second highest (“mostly satisfied”) rating on a scale from 1 to 5. Only three respondents provided a rating of 3 (to some extent) to three different questions, one of which was related to how to use FBS for economic analyses, forecasts and policy-making, other to presentations of other users and the last to the facilitation of discussions.

The evaluation form was divided in four sections: I. Participants’ Learning Objectives II. Contents of the Training III. Methods IV. General and Other.

Some 79% of respondents evaluated that the learning objectives of the training were completely clear and precise, whereas the remaining (21%) considered those mostly clear and precise. None of the participants gave lower assessments (i.e. “to some extent”, “not much” and “not at all”).

The respondents were asked to evaluate attainment of learning objectives in three dimensions: (i) understanding what FBS is, (ii) understanding of FBS methodologies and (iii) application of FBS in economic analyses, forecasts and policy-making. Two third of participants indicated that learning objectives were completely achievements in understanding what FBS is and its applications. However, opinions were evenly split with regard to FBS methodologies: half of the respondents estimated that the learning objectives were completely attained and the other half mostly attained. With regards to the content of the training there was a strongly positive and quite unanimous opinion on its relevance to objectives, structure and clarity (questions 3, 4 and 5), as illustrated in the chart below.

Content of the training

0%

50%

100%

relevance to objectives structure

clarity

mostly completely

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The respondents were unanimous concerning the usefulness of the training for their jobs and organizations. Most of them thought the training was completely (79% of respondents) or mostly (21%) useful for their job. Some of the respondents provided comments on the usefulness of the training to their jobs and their institutions, which are summarized below:

• Extended our knowledge on FBS and acquainted with international methodology. • Familiarized with methods of application of FBS for policy analysis and decision

making. • From methodological aspects I haven’t seen big differences. But, we didn’t analyzed

FBS and its components as widely as with FAO trainers. • FBS will be used for analysis of food demand, structure, compilation of forecasts and

minimum consumption basket. • We will refer to FBS in policy briefs prepared by our organization.

Regarding the training methods appropriateness and efficiency (time use) have been appreciated by the trainees:

The highest rates of the participants were given to Power Point Presentations of trainers, while in evaluation of the practical exercises/cases and facilitated discussions opinions were shared between “completely” and “mostly”.

Methods of training

Mostly 36%

Completely 64%

0% 20% 40% 60% 80%

PowerPoint presentations of trainers

Other presentations

Exercises

Facilitated discussions

completely mostly to some extent

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Finally, the organizational aspect of the training received an overwhelmingly positive appraisal, with almost 90% of respondents giving the highest mark (completely) and the rest “mostly”.

The evaluation form included an open-ended question to enable the participants to provide recommendations to FAO to improve similar training. Some of the most frequent and interesting comments can be summarized as follows:

• This training was additional bridge between users and producers of information. Thank

you for the opportunity. • Such training must be organized more frequently. • Validity and consistency of data/information disseminated by FAO are very important

for us. • I would suggest organization of such trainings in Azerbaijani language. • It is very important to involve high rank officials to such trainings, in order to facilitate

decision making processes.