$15m for Ethiopia's hungry
2004-02-24 14:12
Addis Ababa - The World Food Programme (WFP) has announced that it will provide more than $15m (about R100m) towards Ethiopia's emergency food requirements for 2004.
The money would be used to purchase locally some 400 000 tons of cereals, fortified blended food, pulses edible oil and iodised salt, among others, for the needy, alongside the implementation of emergency school-feeding programme, the UN relief food agency said.
The fund was being made available in response to "the 2004 Humanitarian Appeal for Ethiopia," a joint government and humanitarian partners' appeal made in December.
The WFP's contributions would covers over 40 percent of the total relief food needs of the country for 2004.
Despite the bumper harvest of 2003-04, about 7,2 million Ethiopians still require assistance to meet minimum food requirements this year. This is a substantial decrease from the 13,2 million people who were on emergency food relief last year, according to WFP and the UN Food and Agriculture (FAO) figures released in January. -Sapa-dpa
- SAPA