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Niger: WFP Steps Up Response To Looming Food Crisis

Published on 26 April 2010

A child in Niger is measured for signs of acute malnutrition, a condition affecting one in ten children in the country. Copyright: WFP/Martin Sprecht

Amid a worsening food crisis caused by drought in the eastern Sahel, WFP is more than doubling the number of hungry people it feeds in Niger, providing assistance to 2.3 million people.

DAKAR – Amid a worsening food crisis caused by drought in the eastern Sahel, WFP is more than doubling the number of hungry people it feeds in Niger, providing assistance to 2.3 million people.

“Niger has been hit extremely hard by the drought and the world has to act to prevent massive human suffering and the loss of a generation,” said WFP Executive Director Josette Sheeran.

Sheeran echoed comments made by the United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator, John Holmes, who underlined the need for joint action between development and humanitarian actors to deal with the structural issues underlying the recurrent food crises in the Sahel region.

Scaling up operations

Weak and erratic rainfall across parts of the eastern Sahel has destroyed harvests and parched land used by pastoralist communities to graze livestock. In January, results of a national survey found that more than half Niger’s population of 13.5 million is food insecure.

The ramping up of WFP operations focuses on reducing malnutrition through general food distributions to 1.5 million people. WFP is targeting small children in particular as malnutrition in the early years of life can compromise physical growth irreversibly.

WFP will also target pregnant women and nursing mothers as well as supporting the provision of cereal banks – community cereal stores where women buy grain at subsidized prices at the height of the ‘lean season’ when the previous harvest has run out. Communities restock the banks during the next harvest when prices are lowest.

Working against time

WFP has appealed for US$182 million to scale its operations in one of the poorest countries in the world. The current shortfall is US$96 million. “We need to move quickly to provide a buffer for the people and government of Niger against the shock of a serious food crisis,” said Thomas Yanga, WFP Regional Director for West Africa.

WFP is working against time to provide food assistance as fast as possible, buying most of the needed food from neighbouring countries to significantly shorten the lead time, which is normally about four months, to deliver food to Niger.

In addition to meeting the food needs of people hit by drought, WFP provides food for meals given to hundreds of thousands of school children in Niger and assists people affected by HIV/Aids and tuberculosis.

Source: World Food Programme; www.wfp.org

In Niger, UNICEF, WFP and the Government are working together to prevent malnutrition among children below the age of two

KOLÉRAM, NIGER, 28 April 2010 – Some 800 children aged 6-23 months received their first of four supplementary food monthly rations in Koleram, a village in the region of Zinder, today.

The Nigerien non-governmental organization, Karkara, launched this blanket feeding operation aimed at improving the nutritional status of children aged 6-23 months – who are often the most vulnerable to food shortages -- by providing 500,000 children (aged 6-23 months) with complementary food regardless of their nutritional status.

The Minister of Public Health, Nouhou Hassan, the World Food Programme and UNICEF Country Directors, along with local Zinder authorities officially launched the blanket feeding operation.

“The 500,000 children targeted are in areas found to have global acute malnutrition rates above the emergency threshold of 15% (as defined by WHO) during the June/July 2009 Nutrition and Child Survival Survey, and in areas identified during the last national rapid survey as food insecure,” said the Minister of Public Health, Pr Nouhou Hassan.

All regions of Niger, except Niamey, will benefit from supplementary food distribution where one child out of two suffers from stunting. More than half of the population in Niger is considered as food insecure with 3.4 million people needing immediate help.

“Children are the first to suffer from climatic shocks, a situation we are witnessing today: more and more children are being admitted into therapeutic feeding centers, says Guido Cornale, UNICEF Country Director in Niger. “To prevent their health from deteriorating, UNICEF supports the training of census takers, community mobilization and awareness-raising as well as malnutrition screening in children. These prevention activities are crucial in tackling the situation and ensuring the success of the blanket feeding operation.”

The Nutrition Directorate of the Ministry of Public Health, along with local authorities, coordinates the implementation of the blanket feeding.

A child’s monthly ration of complementary food includes 8.3 kilos of fortified corn soy blend (CSB+) with sugar and 0.75 KG of oil enriched with vitamin A. A total of 17.700 MT of food, provided by WFP, is necessary to feed 500.000 children.

‘The tight timeframe for the mobilization of resources, procurement and dispatching of food for this activity was a challenge, states Richard Verbeeck, WFP Country Director in Niger. The needed quantities of food were available only at international level, and Niger being a landlocked country, two to three months were necessary for them to arrive. WFP had to leverage funds as early as March to ensure timely implementation”.

This operation, supported by WFP and UNICEF and 13 NGOs, is part of the Government’s Response Plan and the Emergency Humanitarian Action Plan was launched following the Government’s appeal on March 10.

Source: www.unicef.org