• COVID feeding data shared with Gov’t, World Bank

• Some 14,427 ‘vulnerable’ households were assisted

• ‘We managed the money as diligently as possible’

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

The COVID-19 food task force distributed 1.447m food parcels and vouchers to needy Bahamians at the pandemic’s height, it was revealed yesterday, as its chair unveiled the comprehensive database provided to the Government.

Susan Larson, who ran the National Food Distribution Task Force created by the former Minnis administration, disclosed the detailed records covering the criteria it used to identify the 14,427 “highly vulnerable” households that became the primary focus for the $53m, 70-week initiative.

While each household remained anonymous, the data included the number of pregnancies, chronic medical ailments, disabilities, children and employment status of each home, which enabled the Task Force - using criteria developed by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and World Food Programme - to target and determine the amount of assistance required by the 54,107 total registrants and their dependents.

Cabinet ministers and government officials in the Davis administration have repeatedly asserted there are no records of the Task Force’s work, and that they have been unable to provide detailed information to the likes of the World Bank on how its $100m loan was used to prevent the collapse of Bahamian society and the economy at the pandemic’s peak in 2020.

However, Tribune Business and other media saw a report dated January 19, 2021, that was submitted to the World Bank by the Task Force and went so far as to identify whether persons assisted were above/below the National Insurance Board (NIB) ceiling or were not making contributions.

It also included a case study on the work performed by Lend A Hand Bahamas, the non-governmental organisation (NGO) working to distribute food on the Task Force’s behalf to the “most densely populated zone” of inner-city New Providence. 

At June 2020, just after the COVID lockdown peak, and with the tourism industry yet to open, Lend A Hand Bahamas was feeding 2,309 beneficiary households comprising 9,900 persons, roughly 50 percent - some 4,900 - of whom were children.

A further data breakdown revealed that 589, more than 25 percent, of those 2,309 households had seen their water and/or electricity disconnected. And some 547 households, or close to 24 percent, were headed by single parents. And, with the “hotels closed, tourism fallen out”, the number of households being aided by Lend A Hand Bahamas soared to 13,750 by the time the Task Force’s “first phase” ended in October 2020.

Mrs Larson said yesterday that the complete database has been shared with both the Ministry of Finance and Ministry/Department of Social Services, both of which have it in their possession. “The database was shared with Ministry of Finance officials who deal with the World Bank,” she added.

“On January 19, we submitted the first report to the World Bank. It laid out for them everything that was going on. I have participated in two meetings with the World Bank since then.” Given what was shared with Tribune Business and other media, it is unclear why the Government is seemingly unable to pass these details on to the World Bank.

Besides the household records, Mrs Larson explained that the COVID-19 feeding programme’s finances were managed via a “weekly dashboard” that every participating NGO had to fill in for every one of the 70 weeks that the initiative lasted. These provided records of the funds flowing from the Government to the NGO’s to feed COVID-hit Bahamian households, many of which had seen all their income sources dry up or severely curtailed due to the economic shutdown.

Besides detailing how many food parcels and vouchers, and the number of households, each NGO was distributing and assisting, the “dashboards” also broke down how they were spending taxpayer monies on food purchases, trucking, shipping, stipends and other overhead costs incurred in the programme’s delivery. Other typical expenses were garbage disposal, warehouse and office rents, fuel, and sanitisation/COVID personal protection equipment.

“Every NGO had weekly dashboards for the 70-week programme,” Mrs Larson explained. “This dashboard template was shared with the financial secretary at the time [Marlon Johnson]. He signed off on this, approved this as a method of record-keeping. The expenditure of each NGO was itemised.....” To further enhance accountability, she restricted access to the “dashboards” once they had been submitted to ensure no one could re-enter the system and alter the data.

The “dashboard” data was then sent to the Ministry of Social Services, which was responsible for approving all COVID-19 food programme payments to the NGOs from the Public Treasury. Mrs Larson said she and the Task Force were especially insistent that, if an NGO still had food programme funds in its account, then this balance was to be deducted from the next disbursement received.

“It’s important to understand we were trying to manage the people’s money as diligently as we possibly could,” she explained. “As phases came to an end, one of the first things we discussed in our weekly meetings held every Monday was how much money did they [the NGOs] have on hand.

“We declared it a priority to manage the money down to zero at the end of every phase. The NGOs had to check with their financial people how much money they had on hand.” If there was a remaining balance, this was then deducted from the next disbursement of funding.

The Task Force chair said the last batch of “dashboards”, including 39 weeks’ for Hands for Hunger and the entire records for the Bahamas Feeding Network, were due to be passed yesterday to the Government-appointed auditor of the COVID feeding programme, Kershala Albury, president and principal consultant at her own firm, ATI Company Ltd.

Mrs Larson said the initial 54,107 household registrants, of which 38,394 or 76 percent were headed by women, were reduced to 18,000 - including the 14,427 deemed most vulnerable - towards the end of 2021. Of those 18,000, 12,800 households registered as being unemployed.

And while 1,026 gave their status as ‘employed’, the household head’s income was typically insufficient to meet the needs of family members with disabilities or chronic illnesses. Some 32 percent of households had persons suffering from medical ailments, and Mrs Larson said the Task Force went so far as to take a “statistically significant” sample from each feeding zone and carry out door-to-door visits.

The results, she added, confirmed that the initiative was “well within the margin of error” when it came to identifying the most vulnerable families needing the Task Force’s urgent assistance. The COVID-19 feeding programme, she added, distributed 474,420 food vouchers and 972,191 food parcels during its 70 weeks for a total of 1.447m units.

Mrs Larson explained that the Task Force focused more on parcels because it was able to purchase food at deeper discounts from wholesalers, while vouchers enjoyed a smaller concession at the retail level. It ultimately reduced the food parcel and supplemented it with a $15 voucher that allowed persons to purchase proteins such as meat.