World Food Programme Fighting Hunger Worldwide

The United Nations is warning of a new food crisis in Africa, with droughts and poor harvests leaving more than 10 million people in need of assistance. Niger, Burkino Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Cameroon and Nigeria have all declared states of emergency in relation to the drought.

With the food crisis escalating in the Sahel region of Africa, it's urgent that children be protected from hunger and kept in school. In Burkina Faso, one of the affected Sahel countries, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) provides school feeding for impoverished children. These meals take on even more importance during the current hunger emergency. (..) In this interview Célestine Ouédraogo of WFP updates us on the status of school feeding in Burkina Faso as the Sahel food crisis unfolds.

Aid groups have warned that hunger threatens between 5 and 9 million people in countries in Africa's Sahel region just below the Sahara including Chad, Niger, Mauritania, Burkina Faso and Mali. (..) Even in an average year 450,000 children in Chad need treatment for acute malnutrition, but the number will increase dramatically this year.

In 2008 developing countries, and poor people within them, were hit hard by the price spike in the international cereals market. Once again food prices are moving up, not that far short of the levels seen three years ago, so does this mean another bout of hardship? Some think so. Last Thursday, the Guardian ran the headline "World food prices enter 'danger territory' to reach record high."

IN SOME ways Alhaji Bunu Fodio is lucky: at least his house is still standing. Most of Kagara, his dusty village in Nigeria’s far north, was smashed to smithereens during this year’s rainy season when an unexpected deluge burst a nearby dam. (..) The rest of the world spends vast sums sustaining life in the Sahel. The UN’s World Food Programme, which is funded largely by governments of rich countries, has asked its backers for $300m-plus to spend on emergency aid this year.

United Nations aid agencies and their partners today launched an appeal for more than $14 million to help the victims of flooding in Burkina Faso rebuild their homes and livelihoods over the next six month. (..) The UN Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF) has already allocated $2 million to aid agencies operating in Burkina Faso to help them deal with the aftermath of the floods. Those funds will go to the World Food Programme (WFP), the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the World Health Organization (WHO) and the UN Population Fund (UNFPA).

Three men yank at the limbs and tail of an emaciated cow to put it into a cart. Animals arriving daily by truck in the Burkina capital Ouagadougou from all over the country are too weak to stand, much less walk. (..) “The worry is for those [animals] that have stayed, given the lack of food and water for them,” said Stéphane Degueurce of the UN World Food Programme (WFP) in Burkina, who recently travelled to affected areas in Burkina’s north and Sahel regions.

The Burkina Faso government says thousands of flood-displaced families have till 30 November to quit temporary camps throughout the capital, Ouagadougou. (..) The World Food Programme will provide food aid to people upon their departure from the camps, Annalisa Conte, WFP head in Burkina Faso, told IRIN. “We will give a ration that will cover two months of their food needs – cereals, beans, vegetable oil, sugar and fortified food blend for the children.”

A growing number of urban families in northwestern Burkina Faso refuse to hospitalize their children diagnosed as severely malnourished because they fear being stigmatized, according to hospital officials in a regional nutrition recovery centre.
Ouahigouya regional hospital takes on the most complicated cases of malnutrition from throughout the region. The director of its nutrition centre, Etienne Zida, told IRIN city children slip through the malnutrition diagnostic system.

For village health volunteers in Burkina Faso who help track malnutrition in their rural communities, farm work during the rainy season takes precedence over their volunteerism, according to the NGO Save the Children. (..) Families with malnourished children receive flour, oil and sugar from the UN World Food Programme as well as soap from Save the Children and green bean seeds from the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).