11 November 2008
The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) warned today that it is facing a serious funding crisis in providing life-saving aid to over 4 million people in Zimbabwe suffering the effects of a disastrous harvest, and it has already been forced to cut rations.
"WFP still requires $140 million to fund its operations in Zimbabwe until the end of March 2009 - with a shortfall of approximately 145,000 tons of food, including 110,000 metric tons of cereals and 35,000 metric tons of other food commodities," the agency said in an update detailing its first month of large-scale distributions in October.
"There is currently no food in the pipeline for distributions in January and February - just when the crisis is reaching its peak and when WFP is aiming to assist over 4 million people each month."
In October WFP distributed 29,000 tons of food to around 2 million vulnerable people across the southern African country and plans to double the beneficiaries in November by scaling up its operations to reach almost 4 million hungry people in rural and urban areas. But it will have to cut back on the individual rations so as to provide something for all beneficiaries.
"In the worst affected communities, people are surviving on one meal a day - at most," WFP said. "There are widespread reports of people skipping meals for an entire day or eating wild foods such as baobab seeds and amarula fruit. Hungry families are being forced to exchange their precious livestock for buckets of maize.
"Other families have no option but to beg for help or to resort to other desperate measures to survive - selling their few remaining household assets, migrating in search of work and food, pulling children out of school, etc."
In November, WFP aims to distribute around 46,000 tons to more than 3.3 million people under the vulnerable group feeding (VGF) programme and around 600,000 under the safety net programmes but will not be able to provide every beneficiary with a full food basket.
"WFP needs additional donations urgently since it takes between six and eight weeks to transform a cash contribution into food on a beneficiary's table," the agency said.
The November cereal ration has been cut from 12 kilograms to 10 kilograms per person per month and the pulse ration from 1.8 kilograms to one kilogram for all VGF beneficiaries and for people receiving take-home rations under the safety net programmes.
"These cuts will allow WFP to stretch its available resources as far as possible but they will leave greater numbers more malnourished and more susceptible to disease," the agency said.
According to the latest UN figures, the number of people needing assistance will rise to 5.1 million, or 45 per cent of the population, at the expected peak of the crisis in early 2009, and WFP plans to provide aid some 4 million every month until the end of March - as long as there are sufficient resources.
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Not surprising, who would want to contribute to an International Food Aid NGO when ZANU-PF/Mugabe are looting international funds deposited with the RBZ?
If food aid plummets just as more people in Zimbabwe are becoming dependent upon it to survive means a lot of hungry, and angry, people.
Maybe it's the only way to remove ZANU-PF/Mugabe from power. When people are starving, they will vote with their fists - bullets be damned!
"Total Empowerment" to starve..........
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FUSHEKE ICHO!! you have no intelligent contribution, kana iri fodya siyana nayo.
I am o tired of hearing of what Tsvangirai did but what does that matter Mugabe and the Zanu-pf has been in charge for over the past 20 years so the problems of Zim truly rest with them and no one else. So again be quiet about Tsvangirai or anyone else b/c Mugabe and the Zanu -pf have been in charge so blame them for Zim's problems.
As for the Ngo's well the people suffer not b/c of them b/c Mugabe and the Zanu-pf loot everything that is in the country and if the people are lucky they get the few leftovers. The bigger issue is the world is in a huge economic crisis which will decrease the food distribution...It is funny you love us when we give but the minute we pull back we are the devil, well just to let you know the devil is Robert Mugabe.
Icho... your comments show you to be nothing but a bigoted racist.
How can you fear the NGO's when they are the ones who are keeping half the country alive. Kick them out and many many many people will die. Critising them is just another attempt to find a scapegoat for Mugabes mismanagement of the Zimbabwean economy, and the situation that Zimbabwe finds itself in today.
Zimbabwe will not improve with Mugabe in power. It will only get worse. Plain and simple.
You must be one of the 170 ->The "smart sanctions" target about 170 of the country's ruling elite, including Mugabe and his second wife, Grace, and include a travel ban and the freezing of foreign assets.
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The beginning of the end of a nation. Humanity, apart from intelligence excelled above other species because it solved the food jinx by storing food. Energy can then be spent on creative activity rather than looking for food daily, like a Monkey does.