WFP INTENSIFIES EFFORTS TO ERADICATE HUNGER IN AFRICA
GERMANY SUPPORTS FAO WITH 17m euros TO COMBAT LOCUSTS IN EAST AFRICA
The Director General of the Food Agriculture Organisation
(FAO), Qu Dongyu, said Germany has
provided 17 million euros to the agency
to provide assistance to those affected by the Desert Locust upsurge in
East Africa.
Germany’s Permanent Representative to FAO, Ulrich
Seidenberger, made the announcement at FAO headquarters in Rome. The new pledge
comes after Germany had contributed three million euro.
“I want to thank Germany for its generous contribution and
for recognising the urgent need to alleviate the alarming impact of the Desert
Locust upsurge. We are working to curb the locusts’ spread but we also need to
safeguard livelihoods and promote early recovery,” Qu said.
FAO’s Desert Locust Information Service says it is the worst
outbreak to strike Ethiopia and Somalia for 25 years and the worst infestation
that Kenya has experienced in 70 years. Djibouti and Eritrea have also been
affected, and locusts have been reported in South Sudan, Uganda and the United
Republic of Tanzania, although the situation there is less dire.
Its Director-General stressed the situation was extremely
alarming in East Africa, a region where 20 million people are already
considered food insecure. There, the swarms have laid eggs and in a few weeks’
time, these will mature, and start to eat crops – right at the start of the
region’s main agricultural season.
“Fighting the locusts is half the battle. The other half is
helping the people affected. Germany’s support will enable FAO to provide much
needed support to the farmers and their families,”Qu said.
The Desert Locust is considered the most destructive
migratory pest in the world. A swarm covering one square kilometer contains 40
million locusts that can eat the same amount of food in one day as 35,000
people.
Pasture and croplands have already suffered damage in
Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia, and there are potentially
severe consequences for the region where millions rely on agriculture and
livestock rearing for their survival.
FAO has appealed for $138 million to assist the countries
that have been impacted. Germany’s announcement raises the amount pledged by
donors to $69 million.
FAO has surged 15 locust experts and other personnel to
support governments with surveillance and coordination of locust control
activities, technical advice and the procurement of supplies and equipment for
aerial and ground operations.
Of the $138 million, FAO has earmarked more than $60 million
to curb the spread of the disease; over $67 million to safeguard livelihoods
and promote early recovery; and close to $10 million to promote regional
co-ordination and preparedness.
Desert Locust monitoring, forecasting and control are at the
heart of FAO’s mandate.
Its Desert Locust Information Service has been in operation
for nearly 50 years. FAO’s well-established field presence, ability to link up
authorities from different countries, and expertise in Desert Locust management
make it a key player in responding to upsurges like that affecting East Africa and the Red Sea area.
55,000 ZIMBABWEANS TO BENEFIT FROM CANADA’S $3M GRANT
Life saving humanitarian operations of the World Food
Programme (WFP) in Zimbabwe received a boost as the Canadian Government has
contributed three million Canadian dollars to support the United Nations agency’s
effort to provide food assistance to about 55,000 people in Matabo district.
Currently about 7.7 million people in Zimbabwe face food
security challenge and WFP says it would require $104 million dollars to
provide life-saving food assistance.
Besides providing Zimbabweans with food to put on the table
and meet their daily nutritional needs, WFP’s Canadian funded food assistance
also provides a cushion for Zimbabweans during the lean season. It protects
them from resorting to detrimental ways of coping, like selling assets or
livestock which will undermine their food security in the longer term.
WFP said it is helping to improve the self-sufficiency of
vulnerable communities by supporting local initiatives to boost agricultural
production, improve access to markets, increase earnings and savings, and
minimise the impact of adverse weather.
WFP Country Coordinator, Eddie Rowe said “ WFP is seriously
concerned about the hunger that millions of Zimbabweans are enduring – and the
very real prospect that their plight will get worse before it gets better.
“This support from Canada will go a long way towards
improving the well-being of food insecure people, particularly children and
women,” he said.
UN RAISES ALARM OVER FOOD INSECURITY IN THE NORTHEAST
The
United Nations said it would require over $182 million urgently to sustain
lifesaving aid for millions of people in Nigeria who are hit severely by the
effect of coronavirus pandemic and the decade-long conflict in the North-East
region, especially Borno, Adamawa and Yobe states.
According to the senior
spokesperson of the World Food Programme (WFP), Elisabeth Byrs, in a statement
made available to AGRICFOCUS, “We are concerned by
conflict-affected communities in northeast Nigeria who already face extreme
hunger and who are especially vulnerable. They are on life-support and need
assistance to survive.
“The three states have been
plagued by insurgency that has spilled over into the Lake Chad region. It
remains among the most severe humanitarian crises in the world, according to
the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), with some
7.9 million mainly women and children in need of urgent assistance today.
“That’s why WFP is
distributing now two months’ worth of food and nutrition assistance in IDP
camps and among vulnerable communities to ensure that people have enough food
while they are on full or partial lockdown”.
She said the WFP is scaling up its operations in the Northeast to serve more people in response to the new challenges of more food insecurity posed by COVID-19.
"However, there have been a
few delays with COVID-19 containment movement restrictions that are affecting
supply chains. These have been generally managed and we have continued
providing assistance. We continue to appeal to all parties to ensure access to
people in need and respect humanitarian space," she said.
WFP’s involvement has
included re-adjusting school meals programmes during school closures by
providing food to take home. The initiative kicked off in the Federal Capital Territory
and the commercial capital Lagos, in mid-May.
The programme led by Nigeria’s
Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs - aims to reach nine million children in three
million homes across the country’s 36 states, where school closures have
affected some 39 million youngsters. The urban poor remain the focus of the
scheme, including the floating slum community of Makoko, where tens of
thousands of people live cheek by jowl, on stilt houses in a village on the
outskirts of Lagos.
AMERICAN FARMLAND TRUST LAUNCHES FUND FOR FARMERS AFFECTED BY COVID-19 CRISIS
American Farmland Trust has c...