Palestine- Last summer’s war in the Gaza Strip saw thousands killed and tens of thousands homeless. During the 52 day conflict, an innovative programme by the World Food Programme and Ramallah-based tech firm OFFTEC provided a lifeline to 300,000 conflict affected people. Using plastic debit cards – just like the ones banks issue – conflict affected people could go into local markets to purchase essential items, including food, bottled water, diapers and soap. This ensured people received needed assistance, kept markets functioning, and enabled a faster recovery following the conflict.

When their house in the Eastern area of the Gaza Strip was heavily damaged as a result of shelling, Reem and her husband Mo`een, together with their three children, were forced to seek shelter in the Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City. “Our world collapsed in the blink of an eye. We were forced to leave all of our belongings”, Reem recalls. “But when we arrived in the hospital we received an electronic voucher from WFP. We used the voucher to purchase food and sanitary items in a shop right next to the hospital”, she said.

Reem`s family was among nearly 300,000 people who received during the conflict emergency and recovery food assistance from the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) through an innovative electronic-voucher system that was developed by OFFTEC to support WFP’s humanitarian work in Palestine.

WFP-OFFTEC partnership pioneers e-voucher system for humanitarian interventions worldwide

The WFP-OFFTEC partnership began in 2010, and led to WFP country offices moving to vouchers around the world. The electronic voucher cards enable WFP to efficiently reach hungry people in places where food is available in local markets and yet unaffordable.

WFP has been the leading programme in providing food assistance for the poor food insecure in Palestine through vouchers. Until late 2010, some 5,500 households (30,000 people) in the West Bank received their food entitlements through WFP`s paper food vouchers. WFP faced a challenge delivering this support: the paper food vouchers were extremely costly and their use could not be easily tracked. Operationally, ensuring secure printing of vouchers and their distribution to beneficiaries and account reconciliation was time consuming. To continue providing vouchers – which beneficiaries liked because they could chose the food they wanted to purchase -- WFP sought proposals from different organizations. OFFTEC Palestine won the tender in its proposal to provide electronic magnetic debit card system which was secure and scalable and could meet all WFP`s requirements

OFFTEC was established in Jerusalem in 1910, and since then the company has evolved to become the leading regional business technology provider of end-to-end innovative and high-quality solutions. In 2007, OFFTEC became a public company, OFFTEC Holding Group PLC, expanding its operations and solutions into Jordan, Palestine, Sudan, Egypt, USA, and Erbil. The success of its e-voucher system became evidence after WFP was able to implement smoothly a gradual scale up of its food voucher activities to reach regularly by 2013 more than 170,000 food insecure people in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, an expansion by more than 5.5 times the levels in 2010.

 “We are sincerely proud to work and become acquainted with an organization like WFP, which has been instrumental in improving the lives of many Palestinians and most importantly our Palestinian children providing them with the necessary nutrients and vitamins through food assistance.” says Jamil Daher, head of OFFTEC Palestine. “WFP`s profound work was manifested lately during the war on Gaza where WFP staff risked their lives to make sure food is distributed to the needy.” he adds.

OFFTEC`s solution has the idea of transforming coupon/physical vouchers into an automatic electronic and online system. This system comprises of two key components: a software and a hardware. The software allows authorized users, including WFP and the cooperating partners, to setup all features of the system, extract inquiries and reports and view transactions. It provides an interface to a database needed for processing the distributions of food items such as dairy products, pulses, eggs, bread and vegetable oil, to eligible beneficiaries at selected local shops.

With the hardware component- Point of Sale (POS) terminals set up at the shops through which a beneficiary`s magnetic card is swiped- each shop keeper is provided the possibility to update distribution data or is prevented from doing so according to specified criteria related to the beneficiary identification and his/her balance. Beneficiaries` credit is top-up into their cards with specific and variable amounts based on criteria set by WFP.

E-vouchers are effective assistance transfer modality during emergencies

Going back to the highlight of WFP-OFFTEC partnership which occurred just few months ago, during the summer humanitarian crisis in Gaza.  The outbreak of a conflict was of high potential in this enclaved strip, yet its unprecedented intensity and permanence was abrupt for many actors. This was not the case for WFP which has been at the forefront of humanitarian actors in terms of immediate response to shocks and outreach to needy people. The high-level preparedness was further strengthened through the longstanding partnership with OFFTEC. “We ensure that extra thousands of cards are printed and ready for immediate distribution in case of any contingency”, says Sahar Natsheh, WFP voucher programme coordinator. “The cards stock met the needs identified at the onset of the conflict. Without the incredible assistance of OFFTEC staff our massive scaling up of e-vouchers to reach hundreds of thousands needy people would have been difficult. We used to call them at any time of the day and they were able to resolve any problem within a very short time”, Sahar emphasizes.  

The innovative characteristic of the e-voucher system was particularly mirrored during the latest Gaza conflict through unique partnerships that were weaved between WFP and other UN agencies and NGOs. The flexibility of the e-voucher system allowed providing conflict-affected people, in addition to WFP`s food assistance, non-food basics such as water, hygiene and sanitary items, and school uniforms. Humanitarian actors like UNICEF and HelpAge entrusted WFP-OFFTEC e-voucher system to effectively deliver assistance to some 92,000 conflict-affected people.

A holistic Approach…

Innovation is integral to WFP`s vision to end hunger worldwide. More specifically for Palestine, WFP`s strategy is to support the Palestinian Authority to use new and innovative approaches to sustainably build food security, focusing on three pillars: relief, resilience and national capacity building and preparedness. The e-voucher programme has substantially contributed to this holistic approach.

“Effectiveness means a greater and sustainable impact”, says Daniela Owen, WFP Country Director and Representative in Palestine. “Our longstanding e-voucher partnership with OFFTEC has promoted the humanitarian act of food assistance to build economic resilience by linking safety nets to local production”, Owen underlines.  

Food vouchers not only help less privileged people to receive urgent or regular food supplies and as a result free their scarce resources to spend them on other basic services such as education and health. Food assistance through vouchers also ensures greater adherence to supporting local economy through supporting pre-determined locally produced food items purchased at participating local traders. Recent studies show that every voucher dollar generates 40 cents of additional sales at participating shops and that 485 new jobs were created in these shops and affiliated producers since the start of the programme. WFP`s voucher progarmme has also been proven to be a source of tax revenues for the local government.  Since 2011, WFP`s e-voucher programme injected US$84 million in the Palestinian market, including US$10 million during the Gaza emergency response. 

“Necessity is the mother of invention” could be a cliché for many but for WFP-OFFTEC partnership it is a vision to serve humanity. 

WFP is the world's largest humanitarian agency fighting hunger worldwide, delivering food assistance in emergencies and working with communities to improve nutrition and build resilience. In 2013, WFP assisted more than 80 million people in 75 countries. WFP’s Palestine office has been working to support Palestinian people in Jerusalem, Gaza and the West Bank since the early 1990s, providing emergency relief during crisis, long term assistance to the poorest households, and capacity building support to the Palestinian Authority.