Though peace was declared in 2003, Liberia continues to struggle to recover after 15 years of civil war. Addressing widespread poverty, providing employment for youth and ex-combatants and increasing domestic food production are all substantial needs. Though Liberia has no shortage of fertile land, many people, especially youth, see farming as an occupation of last resort rather than a viable business opportunity. Consequently, Liberia has to import most of its food, resulting in inconsistent supplies and high prices. On average, Liberian households spend 70 percent of their income on food—a situation that will only worsen as global food prices continue to rise, unless local agricultural production increases dramatically. Through the Agriculture for Children’s Empowerment (ACE) Project, ACDI/VOCA is addressing these needs by engaging youth and demonstrating that farming can be a profitable enterprise.

The ACE Project is developing entrepreneurship and bringing farmers into profitable value chains with the goal of increasing income, improving nutrition and enabling caregivers to better support their children. The project aims to:

• increase local production of key staple foods by supporting paddy rice development in four communities in Bong and Nimba counties, and vegetable production in two communities in Montserrado County;

The guide offers a set of basic guidelines on how to be accountable to local people and measure programme impact in emergency situations and contains a variety of tools on needs assessment and profiling. Its 'good enough' approach emphasises simple and practical solutions and encourages the user to choose tools that are safe, quick, and easy to implement.

Research about children's lives conducted in the volatile setting of armed conflict places particular demands upon researchers. The suggestion that researchers should, whenever possible and appropriate, involve children as meaningful participants in that research may seem unreasonable or inappropriate. However, the production of this paper has been motivated by the conviction that participatory research is especially valuable because of the emergency context. Firstly, such an approach is likely to yield richer and more detailed data than a conventional, adult-led approach. These data can be invaluable to the design of interventions. Secondly, engagement in well-planned research activities can offer direct benefits for young participants by enhancing their skills and awareness. In settings of conflict where the young may be required to play an expanded role in their own protection and in the care of others, their personal development is especially important. Our aim here is to equip researchers to most safely and profitably pursue participatory research with children and, to that end, we explore the specific conceptual, ethical and methodological issues concerned.

The report: presents an analysis of vocational training (VT) programming and the actors involved in northern Uganda; offers VT providers concrete recommendations for programming at each stage in the VT cycle, including best practices and lessons learned; and guides VT programs and youth participants through a market-assessment and self-assessment to integrate market information into program design and create links between VT and the private sector.

This paper explores the nature of the violence that characterises complex humanitarian emergencies and the related implications for modelling livelihoods systems. While noting the importance of livelihoods approaches in complex humanitarian emergencies, it deliberates the limitations of sustainable livelihoods frameworks when applied in environments marked by protracted instability. Adaptations to the model are discussed, with a particular focus on the relationships among violence, assets and liabilities within livelihoods systems. Political economy of violence theories intimate that the assets on which livelihoods systems are constructed in peaceful times may instead become life-and livelihood-threatening liabilities in periods of conflict. Adaptations to livelihood systems in violent settings require that analysts consider violence from policy, institutional and process perspectives. It is suggested that vulnerability should be re-conceptualised as endogenous to livelihoods systems in violent settings. Building on the work of others, a livelihoods model adapted for complex humanitarian emergencies is presented.