World Food Programme Fighting Hunger Worldwide

It's been over two years since the earthquake struck Haiti. Now, with a massive hunger crisis unfolding on multiple fronts in Africa, the Middle East and Asia, the spotlight has shifted away from this country with tremendous reconstruction needs. (..) The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) is helping Haiti provide school meals. Elizabeth Jennings, a public information officer for Haiti, provides us an update in the following interview.

In 2011, the World Food Programme purchased 3.000 metric tons of rice to the farmers in Haiti. The bags are distributed to schools participating in the National School Feeding Programme (NSCP), to prepare the daily hot meals for children. (..) Knowing they have a buyer, farmers are motivated to grow more while children are motivated to go to school where they receive the nutrition they need and an education. It's a virtuous circle that is at the heart of the strategy of the government and WFP to improve food security in Haiti. (..) "It's a long-term benefit for the country," add Myrta Kaulard, WFP Representative in Haiti. "This allows to encourage agricultural production."

School meal programs, administered by the World Food Program, provide what is often a child's only daily meal. (..) The World Food Program feeds 1.1 million Haitian children a day, more than before the earthquake. Parents often send their children to school because of the meal.

Aid agencies working in Haiti need to do a better job of talking and listening to the people they are trying to help in order to boost relief efforts and dissipate tensions, experts say. (..) In response, the WFP decided that the best way to improve its food distribution and food-voucher system was to ensure people understood how it worked.

With his ribs showing and his skin practically hanging off him, Pierre Wisny is painfully thin. (..) The new paste will use Nutriset's recipe, which meets the requirements of major agencies such as the World Food Programme and UNICEF. Each serving must come in an individual 500-calorie pack and have a shelf life of two years.

The President Michel Martelly, the Ministry of National Education and Vocational Training, the UNICEF and the World Food Programme (WFP), will proceed to the official opening of the new school year, This Monday, October 3, 2011 at 8:30 [Haiti time] at the National School of Tabarre, [located in Tabarre 27, after carrefour Fleuriot].

Education is President Michel Martelly's highest priority. (..) At the beginning of the 2011-2012 school year, UNICEF and the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) are renewing their commitment to support the country's efforts in the field of education.

Haitians cleaned up homes and streets Wednesday as rains let up and rivers receded following an early summer storm that caused flooding, wrecked homes and killed more than two dozen people. (..)Temporary shelters in Thomazeau, a town northwest of the capital, continued to receive people as the United Nations’ World Food Program handed out food rations.

Marie Bolivar, a gray-haired woman with a raspy voice, crushes peanuts into paste for sandwiches which she sells by the roadside for 12 cents apiece. These days the paste is thinner, because the price of peanuts has jumped by 80 percent. (..) "Haitians have less room to increase their expenditures on their food," said Myrta Kaulard, Haiti's country director for the U.N. World Food Program. "This is a serious concern."

Former President Bill Clinton was in Haiti last week as part of his ongoing efforts to help the earthquake-devastated country rebuild. Stephanie Tremblay, a UN World Food Programme (WFP) officer, interviewed him about the vital role of school feeding in the reconstruction process.