Israel lifts Gaza total closure after elections

Israel on Wednesday lifted a full closure on Gaza Strip and opened all commercial crossing points before the delivery of limited aid and basic food stuff, Palestinian officials said. The blockade tightened Tuesday due to the Israeli elections. Ra'ed Fatouh of the crossings' coordination committee said that three crossings will be open Wednesday before aid trucks and fuel needed for running the only power plant in Gaza Strip. [...] "86 trucks will pass through Kerem Shalom crossing, 30 of them will go for the UNRWA and 22 for the World Food Program," Fatouh said.

Donors idle as drought, food shortage grips Kenya

Herds of animals pull in from all directions, kicking up clouds of dust beneath a baking sun as they converge on a concrete cylinder in the village of Wargadud, north-east Kenya. [...] Aid agencies say that up to 30 per cent of animal stocks in the wider area have perished, while the rest are producing little, if any, milk. "During the day, we don't eat," says Abdullahi Abdi Hussein, 65, the official in charge of the borehole. "We only have one meal a day, when we used to have three." [...] Aid agencies say it is only a matter of time before children and the elderly start perishing from hunger-related illnesses, particularly if the long rains, which generally arrive in March, also fail. "If people become malnourished, their immune system is depressed so they get sick for other reasons and that is what pushes them over the edge," says Peter Smerdon, a Nairobi-based spokesman for the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP).

Improving Nutrition in South Asia

The World Bank on Tuesday launched a competitive Development Marketplace for Nutrition aimed at finding and funding innovative ideas that will change lives of thousands of pregnant women, infants, and young children in South Asia. According to the bank statement issued here on Wednesday titled “Family and Community Approaches to Improving Infant and Young Child Nutrition,” the Development Marketplace is looking for entrepreneurial organizations across South Asia to submit proposals for local, small‑scale projects which have the potential to be scaled up and replicated. [...] The South Asia Regional Development Marketplace is implemented in partnership with the Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ), Micronutrient Initiative, UNICEF, and the World Food Program.

WFP food rations reach the hungry in Gaza

The World Food Programme (WFP) has distributed two-month rations to more than 222,000 people in Gaza since hostilities erupted there on Dec 27. The distribution of standard rations such as wheat flour, cooking oil and chickpeas and also one-off emergency packages including date bars, bread, high energy biscuits and canned goods had also benefited more than 150,000 people, according to a WFP statement.