World Food Programme Fighting Hunger Worldwide

Prolonged dry spells have driven almost four million people to food insecurity in Malawi and oil-rich Angola, in Southern Africa. (..) The World Food Programme (WFP), which is currently distributing aid to 1.8 million people [in Malawi], says it needs $14 million to cover its shortfall. (..) WFP and partners have also just launched an innovative system using mobile phones to transfer cash to more than 100,000 people, which will allow them to buy food in local markets. FEWS NET estimates these initiatives will aid the almost 2 million people in need of assistance.

The United Nations food relief agency today announced it is scaling up its efforts to assist more than 3.5 million people in drought-hit areas of southern Africa, particularly in Malawi, Zimbabwe and Lesotho, who are now facing the start of the hunger season. “Large numbers of smallholder farmers and their families are in the grip of what is set to be one of the harshest hunger seasons of recent years,” said the World Food Programme’s (WFP) Deputy Regional Director for Southern Africa, Brenda Barton.

A nutrition act and new crops are at the centre of the Malawi government's latest attempts to overcome the effects of annual food shortages that affect more than 10% of the population. (..) Food shortages affect 1.6 million people every year, and an estimated 47% of children have stunted growth because of undernutrition, making them more vulnerable to illness and learning difficulties.

An active monsoon and above normal temperatures triggered heavy downpours and flash floods during this year’s rainy season across West Africa and the Sahel, killing hundreds of people, displacing hundreds of thousands more and devastating farms in some of the countries already hit by a severe drought and acute food shortages.

The World Food Programme is seeking $30 million to feed more than 1 million people in Malawi facing severe shortages due in large part to a disastrous fight the former leader of the southern African country picked with international donors. (..) Prolonged dry spells, high food prices and economic difficulties have left many people across Malawi struggling to find enough to eat this year, the U.N.'s food relief agency, WFP, said.

"The situation is very serious," says the WFP director, Abdoulaye Diop. "Our field staff have observed that households in parts of the country have harvested almost nothing. Our first priority will be to make sure that vulnerable people have enough food to sustain themselves through this lean season. At the same time, we must invest in more long-term solutions."

In recognition that malnutrition is an enemy to the country’s development, the Irish government and the World Food Programme (WFP) towards the end of last year signed a Memorandum of Understanding for a K225 million grant to support Malawi government in its Supplementary Feeding Programmes (SFPs). (..) WFP Country Director, Abdulaye Diop, also hailed the grant saying the contribution from the Irish Aid to Malawi’s fight against malnutrition was timely. “It will enable us to reach out more malnourished pregnant or lactating women and children in the country,” Diop said.

Malawi’s maize-growing central and southern regions have not had good rains, prompting concerns about possible shortages of the staple in the coming months.

Ten districts in Malawi — nine in the South and one in the Centre—are expected to receive relief food from WFP following shortages that have hit these areas due to erratic rainfall. The World Food Programme (WFP) and three of the country’s donors have since embarked on a Targeted Food Distribution Support Programme to the Malawi Government to rescue the more than 201,000 people expected to be affected.

Devaluation, fuel shortages and economic mismanagement have conspired to push staple food prices to “alarming levels” in urban areas of Malawi, where even catching a bus to work has become an unaffordable luxury for many, according to residents and analysts.