RATIN was developed to help reduce regional food insecurity by strengthening the ability of markets to provide access to affordable food to poor households and improve food availability through providing adequate incentives to producers. It came out of the realization that although there are households among the food insecure that are structurally poor and are heavily dependent on food donations, there are also market-dependent households who are able to purchase food if it is available at the right time, price and quantity in the local markets through enhanced effective competition.

The major task of RATIN is to supply traders with improved early warning marketing and trade information that would lead to more efficient and competitive transactions in food trade between surplus and deficit regions in East Africa. Small and medium scale cross-border traders account for over 80 percent of regional trade in maize, beans and rice in East Africa. Consequently, they are the main target group of the RATIN information.

The World Food Programme is the world’s largest humanitarian agency fighting hunger worldwide. WFP is part of the United Nations system and is voluntarily funded. In emergencies, we get food to where it is needed, saving the lives of victims of war, civil conflict and natural disasters. After the cause of an emergency has passed, we use food to help communities rebuild their shattered lives.

Born in 1962, WFP pursues a vision of the world in which every man, woman and child has access at all times to the food needed for an active and healthy life. We work towards that vision with our sister UN agencies in Rome -- the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) -- as well as other government, UN and NGO partners.

The Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET) is a USAID-funded activity that collaborates with international, regional and national partners to provide timely and rigorous early warning and vulnerability information on emerging and evolving food security issues. FEWS NET professionals in the Africa, Central America, Haiti, Afghanistan and the United States monitor and analyze relevant data and information in terms of its impacts on livelihoods and markets to identify potential threats to food security.

The FAMIS is a COMESA-wide Food and Agriculture Market Information System. The FAMIS is an electronic web based information system that captures trade information for major tradable commodities in the COMESA region. It aims at improving agricultural marketing through the dissemination of market information, policy changes and impacts in order to enhance decision making by all stake-holders thereby improving policy implementation in Member States.