Economic Recovery from Ebola for Liberia (EREL) FY16 Q3 Quarterly Report April--June 2016

The program targets three of the most affected counties – Lofa, Montserrado, and Margibi – and aims to fill minimum food basket gaps, maintain normal agricultural production, protect vulnerable households' assets from depletion, and minimize the negative impacts on child nutrition. The program consists of two components: direct cash transfers to the most vulnerable households and agricultural input vouchers targeting vulnerable households that contain smallholder farmers. At the end of the EREL program, each beneficiary household will have received a total of $252 USD split over six tranches, which equals $42 USD per tranche. Among the 30,000 households, 10,000 small-holder farming households will benefit from agricultural inputs valued at $60 USD. Direct cash transfers to beneficiaries are unconditional, while the receipt of agricultural inputs is conditional to participating in basic agronomic best practice training. During the quarter, April-June 2016, the EREL program made significant progress towards its expected results, particularly with an increased number of beneficiaries compared to previous quarters. Registration records show that 28,307 households had been registered by the end of the quarter. Cumulatively, the EREL program had provided at least one tranche of cash transfers to 21,752 households (108,760 individuals) in the three counties. By the end of the quarter, 9,978 households (49,890 individuals) had received five tranches of cash transfers out of the expected six tranches of cash transfers. The post-distribution monitoring and follow-up regarding household dietary diversity and household hunger surveys conducted during the quarter indicated that cash enabled beneficiaries to meet both food and other basic needs, including health and education. The household hunger survey revealed that beneficiaries are less hungry than during the baseline period, and findings of the dietary diversity survey showed that more beneficiaries have highly diversified diets as compared to the baseline period. The EREL program continued its cash transfers to households directly and economically affected by the Ebola Virus Disease in Montserrado, Margibi, and Lofa counties. By the end of the quarter, 21,752 households (108,760 individuals) had received at least one cash transfer through the EREL program. The program is on track and expects to reach its maximum number (30,000) by the next reporting quarter. The total amount of cash disbursed to program beneficiaries during this quarter was $1,425,270 USD, and the EREL program has disbursed a total of $3,645,264 USD from May 2015 through the end of the reporting quarter. This amount disbursed so far constitutes 48.2% of the total amount budgeted for cash transfers to beneficiaries ($7,560,000 USD).