News releases

Bissau – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP), together with the Chinese Embassy in Guinea-Bissau and the Ministry of National Education have carried out the first distribution of take-home rations of rice to children with disabilities, marking an important step in the fight against malnutrition and school exclusion of children with disabilities in Guinea-Bissau.

MASERU – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has welcomed a US$ 1.7 Million contribution from the Government of Japan to support the provision of daily meals to some 50,000 pre-primary school learners in Early Childhood Care and Development Centres (ECCDs) countrywide and the training of 300 farmers in the Mohale’s Hoek and Quthing regions of Lesotho over the next 12 months.

Lilongwe, Malawi – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) today welcomed a US$9.7 million (MK 8 billion) contribution from the United States Government to help nearly 400,000 food insecure Malawians become more resilient to the impacts of climate change.

BOUNNEUA, LAO PDR – The Ministry of Health, provincial authorities, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and UNICEF have today launched a project supported by the Republic of France, focusing on improving the nutrition status of children under five in Lao PDR’s northernmost province of Phongsaly.

CAIRO – The United Nations’ World Food Programme (WFP) and Seven Circles “Empowering through” have launched the ‘Empowering Women through Cooking’ (EWC) cookbook in Egypt.

BALI, INDONESIA – The United Nation’s World Food Programme (WFP) is attending the Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction (GPDRR) from 23-29 May to call for urgent action in a time of increasing disasters and growing humanitarian needs.

PANAMA CITY – The number of severely food insecure people has shot up by over half a million between December 2021 and March 2022 in Latin America and the Caribbean, as the region struggles to cope with the fallout of COVID-19, now coupled with the consequences of the conflict in Ukraine, warns the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP).

Khartoum – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) in Sudan has received a donation of EUR 2.5 million from the Government of Italy through the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation (AICS) to support emergency nutrition activities in Sudan.

PHNOM PENH – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) is organizing a two-day technical training this week on rice fortification to support the development of in-country fortification capacity - in partnership with Green Trade and the Cambodia Rice Federation.

COLOMBO – The Government of Japan today announced a USD 1.5million (LKR 600 million) funding to help the Government of Sri Lanka respond to the ongoing economic crisis. The funds will be used by the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) to provide food assistance to children and families in need of support.

ABIDJAN – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) is today calling for a massive expansion of proven solutions that help fix broken food systems and make communities affected by land degradation more resilient to shocks.

BAGHDAD – WFP Iraq is to receive US$1 million of the US$91.6 million that the Government of Sweden has contributed to the organization’s global flexible funding for 2022.

N’DJAMENA – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) receives a contribution of US$5 million from the Government of Japan to provide food and nutrition assistance to crisis-affected people in Chad.

NEW YORK – The UN World Food Programme (WFP) Executive Director, David Beasley, addressed the United Nations Security Council today on the impact of the war in Ukraine on global food security. Here are selected highlights from his remarks:

Call for US$ 10.1 million to provide critical assistance as economic shocks take their toll

DUSHANBE – British Ambassador to Tajikistan Tim Jones visited Vakhsh, Jaloliddini Balkhi, and Yovon districts of Khatlon Region and saw first-hand the school feeding programme implemented by the United Nations World Food Programe (WFP).

DILI –The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and the Ministry of Health today started to distribute Super Cereal, a fortified blend rich in vitamins and minerals, to vulnerable groups. Procured with funding contribution from China, the nutritious food will be distributed to more than 144,000 malnourished pregnant and breastfeeding women across all 13 municipalities over the next four months.

BAGHDAD – In 2021, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) received a total of a CAD 5.5 million contribution from the Government of Canada, including CAD 1 million from a regional project between Canada and WFP. This donation has helped WFP provide food assistance to 255,000 displaced Iraqi families and 72,000 Syrian refugees living in camps as well as emergency livelihood restoration activities throughout 2021.

SANA’A/YOKOHAMA – The United Nations World Food Programme has welcomed a US$ 10 million contribution from the Government of Japan to provide life-saving food assistance in Yemen, where people are pushed to the brink due to a prolonged conflict, an economic crisis, and the fallout of the war in Ukraine.

ABIDJAN – With today’s start of the 15th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP15) of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), the World Food Programme is making available to the media, experts on resilience and food systems who can comment on the linkages between desertification and hunger, as well as on large scale solutions and greening the Sahel.

Humanitarian assistance averted a catastrophe in the harsh winter months – but hunger continues across the country at unprecedented levels.

KABUL – 19.7 million people, almost half of Afghanistan’s population, are facing acute hunger according to the latest Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) analysis conducted in January and February 2022 by Food Security and Agriculture Cluster partners, including the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and many NGOs.

CAIRO – The war in Ukraine has dealt a fresh hammer blow to Syria’s ability to feed itself just as the country struggles to deal with levels of hunger that are up by half since 2019, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) said today on the eve of the annual donor pledging conference held in Brussels.

ROME – The United Nations World Food Programme is today calling for the re-opening of the ports in the Odesa area of southern Ukraine so that food being produced in the war-torn country can flow freely to the rest of the world, before the current global hunger crisis spins out of control.