United Nations Scaling Up Food Aid For West Africans Struggling Amid Rising Prices
29 July 2008 - The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has announced it is expanding operations in West Africa to feed an
additional 1.4 million people who are struggling due to high food prices in Guinea, Mauritania, Sierra Leone, Liberia,
Burkina Faso and Senegal.
"WFP is taking vital steps to ensure the poorest people in West Africa are not pushed over the edge by the impact of
high food prices," said Thomas Yanga, WFP's Regional Director for West Africa, adding that WFP's efforts are designed to
complement government responses already in place.
WFP added the 1.4 million new beneficiaries to the 3.6 million people it was already planning to assist this year in the
six countries, which have been severely impacted by a combination of increased high food and fuel prices, and poor
harvests owing to floods and droughts.
WFP notes that over the past 12 months, food costs for its operations in the region have increased by almost 60 per cent
and overall operational costs are now 30 per cent higher. Increased fuel prices have also pushed up transportation costs
as many regions in need of assistance are landlocked.
The agency is scaling up food distributions to the hardest-hit areas across the region. In addition, malnourished
children, pregnant and nursing women, primary school children and people affected by HIV/AIDS will also benefit from WFP
food assistance.
This month WFP started distributions to an additional 600,000 people in Guinea's capital, Conakry. It also started food
distributions last week in the country's rural areas to help cover the immediate needs of families - many of whom are
surviving on cassava and mangoes - until the next harvest.
Meanwhile, in Mauritania - which depends on imports for 70 per cent of its food needs - the agency stocked cereal banks
in the beginning of the rainy season, which allowed farmers to acquire cereals at a reasonable price and to plant their
seeds, rather than resort to eating them.
WFP has also scaled up its distributions in Sierra Leone, Liberia, Burkina Faso and Senegal to reach hundreds of
thousands people, including young children and pregnant women.
ENDS