CC.5.1 Percentage of people supported by WFP operations and services who are able to meet their nutritional needs through an effective combination of fortified food, specialized nutritious products and actions to support diet diversification

CC.5.1 Percentage of people supported by WFP operations and services who are able to meet their nutritional needs through an effective combination of fortified food, specialized nutritious products and actions to support diet diversification

VERSION

V3.0 - 2026.03 — Existing

INDICATOR CODE

CC.5.1

TECHNICAL OWNER

PRG-S Nutrition

INDICATOR TYPE

Country Level Cross-cutting Indicator

Priority Area: Enabling nutrition and healthy diets

INDICATOR CLASSIFICATION

Complementary

INDICATOR SCOPE

Programme specific

APPLICABILITY

This indicator is applicable at CSP level.

This indicator is applicable and recommended to CSPs targeting direct/Tier 1 beneficiaries.

UNIT OF MEASUREMENT & ANALYSIS

Unit of measurement: Percentage of beneficiaries

Unit of analysis: individual level

DEFINITION

This indicator measures the percentage of direct (tier 1) beneficiaries who are supported by WFP operations who are able to meet their nutritional needs through an effective combination of fortified food, specialized nutritious products and actions to support diet diversification.

Below are some key terms for this indicator:

Nutrition-specific programming implemented at scale incorporates a comprehensive approach to address malnutrition. It involves a strategic combination of fortified foods, specialized nutritious products, and initiatives promoting diet diversification. This approach ensures that individuals, particularly vulnerable groups such as women and children, receive essential nutrients and micronutrients.

Nutrition-sensitive programming and Actions to support diet diversification: Healthy diets are of optimal quantity and adequate quality to prevent malnutrition in all its forms, ensure optimal growth and development, and protect against diet-related illnesses and mortality. A healthy diet is adequate, diverse, safe, and balanced in quantity and quality. WFP implements a comprehensive approach to address malnutrition through nutrition-sensitive programming at scale using various strategies that prioritize diversification of diets measures to improve access, availability and affordability to food.

Beneficiaries are counted when they benefit from one or more of the following nutrition-sensitive programme components:

1. Targeting of nutritionally vulnerable groups

2. Nutrition social and behaviour change (SBC)

3. Adequate quantity and nutritional quality of food, cash-based or voucher transfers (including school feeding)

4. Multi-sectoral packages through integration or co-location

5. Assets that improve food, health, and living environments

6. Programmes that support increased production of nutritious foods

Beneficiaries of a nutrition-sensitive component are counted based on the methodology found here in this internal guidance: Beneficiaries receiving a nutrition-sensitive component.

Fortified food: Foods to which nutrients have been added to make them more nutritious, including staple foods and oil. Please note that the term “fortified food” does not include special nutritious foods.

Specialized nutritious products: (also known as specialized nutritious foods) WFP uses a wide range of specialized nutritious foods to improve the nutritional intake of beneficiaries as part of malnutrition management and prevention programming and/or address nutritional vulnerabilities as part of nutrition-sensitive programme approaches. They range from fortified blended foods (FBF) such as Super Cereal (SC) and Super Cereal Plus types and micronutrient powders (MNP) to lipid-based nutrient supplements (LNS). There are three types of LNS:

1) Lipid-based nutrient supplements large quantity (LNS-LQ; e.g. RUSF)

2) Lipid-based nutrient supplements medium quantity (LNS-MQ; e.g. Plumpy’doz)

3) Lipid-based nutrient supplements small quantity (LNS-SQ; e.g. nutributter).

For specialized nutritious foods included in the indicator, please see the factsheet on specialized nutritious food.

RATIONALE

WFP has committed to enabling nutrition and healthy diets as a key cross-cutting component of its Strategic Plan. Building on WFP’s expertise as an organization able to reach the furthest behind, nutrition integration involves shifting, extending, and adjusting approaches to ensure that they support improved outcomes for the most vulnerable. This indicator represents WFP’s commitment to maximise the contribution we make to preventing malnutrition and improving diets – including in the face of shocks and crises.

WFP aims to help reduce malnutrition and improve diets by expanding access to direct nutrition services in close collaboration with other nutrition actors and simultaneously integrating nutrition objectives and activities across its portfolio. To achieve this, WFP will invest in programmes, operations and platforms that tackle both underlying and immediate drivers of poor diets and malnutrition and that support sustained improvements, particularly among women and young children.

This cross-cutting indicator represents scaling up direct nutrition interventions when and where relevant, transforming all operations and services to support diet diversification, and maximizing convergence between systems and activities.

This indicator is a step towards quality programming for nutrition-specific and nutrition-sensitive programming, as it highlights the importance of meeting minimum service standards to ensure beneficiaries truly benefit from the efforts of nutrition interventions.

By tracking the percentage of beneficiaries directly benefiting from nutrition-specific and nutrition-sensitive programmes, the indicator provides a measure of the ability of WFP programmes to meet the nutritional needs of target populations through the provision of fortified food, specialized nutritious products, and actions to support diet diversification.

DATA COLLECTION TOOL

Data source: COMET / Monthly distribution reports on number of beneficiaries reached (direct tier 1) and annual adjusted beneficiary figures.

SAMPLING REQUIREMENTS

N/A

INDICATOR CALCULATION FOR REPORTING

This indicator is calculated by summing the number of people who benefit from management of acute malnutrition (MAM), prevention programmes and number of people who benefit from a nutrition-sensitive component, and dividing it by people receiving direct food and/or cash-based transfer and/or capacity strengthening from WFP, expressed as a percentage.

Overlaps and double counting should be considered and removed for both the numerator and denominator at the calculation stage.

DATA ENTRY AND DISAGGREGATION IN CORPORATE SYSTEMS

Data for this indicator is reported at CSP level.

Values are recorded in the logframe.

Data entry:

• Baseline and targets are entered as percentages, disaggregated by sex

• Follow-up values are to be recorded as numerator and denominator in absolute figures, in line with the indicator calculation formula above. Final percentage value will be automatically calculated by the system.

Mandatory disaggregation:

• Sex

Note: For the first reporting year, and if a Country office, intends to collect data annually, they must input the first collected value as the baseline in COMET. No values should be entered for follow-up at this stage. The “no data function” and its sub-function “Not applicable” should be used to report on the follow-up value. Subsequent data collected in the following year will then be recorded as follow-up values in COMET.

BASELINE

New CSP/CSP activities: The first year’s monitoring value should be set as the baseline value. If a Country office intends to collect data annually on an exceptional basis, they must input the first collected value as the baseline in COMET. No values should be entered for follow-up at this stage. Subsequent data collected in the following year will then be recorded as follow-up values in COMET.

Ongoing CSP/CSP activities: The first monitoring value for the CSP serves as a baseline.

TARGET SETTING

Annual target:

For the first year of monitoring, no annual target is reported.

After the first year, each annual target should be an increase from the previous year. If uncertain, it is recommended to target an increase of at least 10 percent each year.

A target of at least 80% is recommended by the end of CSP. However, this can be lowered depending on contextual realities and the baseline value.

FREQUENCY OF DATA COLLECTION

Annually (mandatory); Biannually (recommended)

INTERPRETATION

This indicator is a proxy for the efforts made to maximize integration of nutrition within WFP supported programmes; and thus, actions to support diet diversification. An increase in the indicator value indicates improvements in effective nutrition integration in the Country Office programme portfolio. It further shows improved progress by the Country Office in delivering quality nutrition programmes that meet the nutritional needs of target populations and address the underlying causes of malnutrition.

REPORTING EXAMPLE(S)

In 2026, 85% of beneficiaries in Madagascar were able to meet their nutritional needs through an effective combination of fortified food, specialized nutritious products and actions to support diet diversification.

The results highlight the effectiveness of WFP Madagascar CO’s approach in combatting malnutrition through a combination of nutrition-specific and nutrition-sensitive programming which improved the nutrition outcomes of the vulnerable communities in Madagascar.

INDICATORS COLLECTED & ANALYSED AT THE SAME TIME

The following indicators may be reported along with this indicator:

• CC.5.2 Percentage of WFP beneficiaries who benefit from a nutrition-sensitive programme component

• CC.5.3 Nutrition-Sensitive Score

COMPLEMENTARY QUALITATIVE RESEARCH

N/A

DECISIONS DATA CAN INFORM

This indicator informs decisions on programme evaluation, resource allocation, programme design, advocacy, partnerships, and reporting within WFP. It evaluates programme effectiveness, guides resource allocation based on effective interventions, drives program design and modifications for improved outcomes, provides evidence for advocacy efforts and partnerships, and contributes to transparent reporting and accountability in addressing nutritional goals.

VISUALIZATION

The indicator can be visualized using stacked bar charts, line charts, area charts, and donut charts.

These visualizations represent the overall percentage, trend over time, cumulative proportion, and distribution of people meeting their nutritional needs through different interventions.

These visualizations provide clear and informative representations of the indicator's data, enabling a better understanding of WFP's effectiveness in meeting nutritional needs.

LIMITATIONS

The indicator is a proxy of efforts made but cannot measure nor guarantee the quality of programming nor that they achieve the intended impact of diet diversification.

Although country offices should always strive to estimate and count beneficiaries with the highest rigour and accuracy, WFP operates in contexts that do not always allow for total accuracy. That said, an acceptably accurate figure can be calculated if a clear definition with stated assumptions and methodologies is consistently provided and applied. In all cases, estimating and counting beneficiaries should be approached with common sense, especially when it comes to estimating overlaps and new beneficiaries. Overlap can occur between and within strategic outcomes, activities, activity tags and cooperate guidance to remove overlaps should be applied.

FURTHER INFORMATION

WFP Nutrition-Sensitive Guidance Summary | WFPgo

Monitoring Handbook

Guidance note on estimating and counting beneficiaries