There should also be greater scope for maintenance activities, if only to ensure that the schemes launched with the help of food aid can be carried on efficiently after the cessation of aid. Renewed interest in maintenance and rehabilitation activities would enable poorer countries to benefit more fully from food aid allocations, and local communities might be involved to a greater extent. Conversely, small farmers and agricultural workers are not covered by food aid in the seasons when they are faced with major energy-consuming tasks such as harvesting, planting, and weeding. Similarly, cattle may be used at these times for such operations as threshing, and may also be in need of better feeding. Food aid provided for this purpose would help directly to increase agricultural production.
More research is needed on the nutritional effects of such schemes, especially on the last group.
This consideration militates in favour of an integrated, or at least closely coordinated, approach in which feeding schemes form one element in a wider programme designed to raise the well-being and health of poorer and more vulnerable groups. More study is also needed on possible negative aspects of feeding programmes, such as the effects of habituation to new foods beyond the reach of beneficiaries when aid ceases. Such study could help develop useful guidelines in avoiding habituation. A greater effort, too, should be made to link such schemes with the increased consumption and production of local food by means of new and acceptable products. Close attention should be given to logistic administrative and storage problems, which largely determine the degree of the success of the programmes.