TIG Post

Tag: World Food Programme (WFP)

  • Food aid to Ethiopia’s Tigray is ‘not meeting needs,’ according to the UN

    Even though all four road corridors are now open, access to some parts of Tigray remains restricted, according to the World Food Programme.

    Even as a ceasefire takes hold in war-torn northern Ethiopia, aid deliveries into Tigray are “not matching the needs” of the region, according to the UN food agency.

    The World Food Programme (WFP) and its partners “need access to all parts of the region to deliver food and nutrition assistance to 2.3 million vulnerable people,” according to a statement issued by the WFP on Friday.

    Restoring intervention deliveries to Tigray was a key component of a November 2 agreement to end a two-year war that has killed untold numbers of people and triggered a humanitarian crisis.

    The WFP said all four road corridors into Tigray had reopened since the ceasefire and humanitarian flights were flying into main cities, allowing a significant increase in aid supplies to reach the region.

    However, it added that “access into some parts of eastern and central zones of Tigray remain constrained – affecting up to 170,000 mothers and children in need of food assistance.”

    Aid into the region ground to a halt in late August when fighting resumed between the Ethiopian government and its allies, and fighters loyal to Tigray’s rebellious authorities.

    Even before the suspension of aid, the UN had warned many in Tigray already faced starvation, with some 90 percent of its six million people dependent on food assistance.

    The region was isolated from the world for more than a year and faced severe shortages of medicines and limited access to electricity, banking and communications.

    Since November 15 when road access improved, WFP said nearly 100 trucks had transported 2,400 metric tonnes of food and 100,000 litres (26,417 gallons) of fuel into the region.

    Humanitarian flights carrying passengers to Mekele, the regional capital, have resumed for the first time since August, after receiving government approval. Aid charters into Shire, a northern city, also commenced for the first time ever.

    It said an estimated 13.6 million people across Tigray and its neighbouring regions of Amhara and Afar were dependent on humanitarian aid as a result of the war, which broke out in November 2020.

    Tigray’s authorities had been resisting central rule for months when Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed accused their leadership of attacking federal army camps and sent troops into the region.

    The two parties signed a peace deal in South Africa on November 2 that agreed to unfettered aid into Tigray.

  • Air strike debris hit aid lorry in Tigray – WFP

    A driver of a lorry carrying humanitarian aid has been injured after being hit by debris from a drone strike in Ethiopia’s Tigray region

    The incident happened on Sunday, according to a spokesman of the World Food Programme.

    “Flying debris from the strike injured a driver contracted by WFP and caused minor damage to a WFP fleet truck,” the spokesperson is quoted to have told the Reuters news agency.

    The lorry was delivering food to internally displaced people in Tigray, Reuters reports.

    A spokesman for the rebel TPLF Getachew Reda termed the incident “an outrageous crime.”

    Several previous air strikes have been reported by the Tigray rebels since fresh confrontations erupted on 24 August – which have not been acknowledged by federal authorities.

  • WFP: 22 million face starvation in horn of Africa

    The number of people at risk of starvation in the drought-ravaged horn of Africa has increased to 22 million, according to the UN’s World Food Programme.

    Years of insufficient rainfall across Kenya, Somalia, and Ethiopia have caused the worst drought in 40 years and conditions akin to famine in the hardest-hit areas, aid groups say.

    An unprecedented four failed rainy seasons have killed millions of livestock, destroyed crops, and forced 1.1 million people from their homes in search of food and water.

    “The world needs to act now to protect the most vulnerable communities from the threat of widespread famine in the Horn of Africa,” said WFP executive director David Beasley.

    “There is still no end in sight to this drought crisis, so we must get the resources needed to save lives and stop people plunging into catastrophic levels of hunger and starvation.”

    At the start of 2022, WFP warned that 13 million people across the three countries faced starvation, and appealed for donors to open their purses at a time of great need.

    But funds were slow in coming, with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine among other crises drawing attention from the disaster in the Horn, humanitarian workers said.

    Russia’s invasion also sent global food and fuel prices soaring, making aid delivery more expensive.

    By the middle of the year, when rain failed to appear again in Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia, the number in extreme need soared to 20 million and warnings of famine grew more urgent.

    WFP says by September, at least 22 million people could face starvation.

    “This number will continue to climb, and the severity of hunger will deepen if the next rainy season… fails and the most vulnerable people do not receive humanitarian relief,” WFP said in a statement.

    “Needs will remain high into 2023 and famine is now a serious risk, particularly in Somalia” where nearly half the population of 15 million is seriously hungry.

    WFP said $418 million was needed over the next six months to help the worst-off.

    Last month, the United States announced $1.2 billion in emergency food and malnutrition treatment to help avert famine in the Horn of Africa, and urged other nations to do more.

    Source: AFP

     

  • U.N. cutting food rations in Sahel amid ‘alarming’ food insecurity

    Up to 18 million people in Africa’s drought-stricken Sahel region will face severe food insecurity over the next three months, the United Nations warned Friday.

    A spokesman for the World Food Programme (WFP), Tomson Phiri, told a regular press briefing in Geneva that the organization was facing a “severe shortage of funds” to help these people.

    “The needs are very high, but resources are low,” he said, which has forced the agency to reduce the food aid rations it distributes in some countries in the region.

    In Chad, for example, low funding levels have forced WFP to reduce emergency rations for IDPs and refugees by 50 percent since June 2021. If donors do not provide more funds, WFP will also have to stop providing cash assistance in early July in some parts of the country.

    According to projections by the UN Office of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), up to 18 million people in the Sahel region will face severe food insecurity over the next three months, “the highest number since 2014.

    This situation is the result of a combination of factors, according to the UN, which cites conflict, the Covid pandemic, drought and rising food prices.

    “In the Sahel, 7.7 million children under the age of five are expected to suffer from malnutrition. 1.8 million of them are severely malnourished and if aid operations are not intensified, this number could reach 2.4 million by the end of the year,” said an Ocha spokesman, Jens Laerke.

    “The situation has reached alarming levels in Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali and Niger, where people will experience emergency levels of food insecurity during the lean season between June and August,” he added.

    The “lean season” is the period when the previous year’s crops are consumed while the current year’s crops are not yet harvested.

    The United Nations has released $30 million from its Central Emergency Response Fund to help the affected communities.

    Source: Africa news