Situation: The Gambia

The Gambia is a least developed and low-income, food-deficit country with a predominantly subsistence agrarian economy. It is ranked 155th out of 177 countries in the 2006 United Nations Human Development Index with 69 percent of the population living below the poverty line.

Poor households have limited access to basic food commodities and domestic food production meets only 50 percent of the national food requirements.
The latest national nutrition survey (2005) by the National Nutrition Agency (NaNA), rated acute malnutrition at 7 percent and stunting at 17.8 percent; micronutrient deficiencies are a severe problem especially amongst children.

Crop harvest have experienced two years of decline with the 2007- 2008 harvest representing a decline of 35 percent from 2005- 2006, and the price for the staple food, rice, has increased by 39 percent from January 2008. In addition, fuel prices have been increased by ten percent in May 2008.