News releases

WASHINGTON – As classrooms around the developing world begin to re-open, the U.N. World Food Programme is receiving US$119 million from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to provide school meals in five countries in Asia and Africa.

Geneva/ Rome - UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, and the World Food Programme (WFP) are warning that severe underfunding, conflict and disasters – as well as supply chain challenges, rising food prices and loss of income due to COVID19 - threaten to leave millions of refugees across Africa without food.

NAIROBI – The dire socio-economic consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic may more than double the number of hungry people in East Africa and the Horn over the next three months, a report from the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has found.

KIGALI – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) today welcomed a contribution of £3 million (US$3.8 million) from the United Kingdom to help save the lives of over 60,000 Burundian refugees in Mahama camp in eastern Rwanda who had faced ration cuts this month.

KIGALI – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has received €1 million (US$1.1 million) from the European Commission to provide food and nutritional assistance to more than 60,000 Burundian refugees in Mahama camp in eastern Rwanda.

KIGALI- The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) in Rwanda welcomes €500 000 (US$600,000) in humanitarian funding from the European Union (EU) that will help meet the most pressing food needs of over 60,000 vulnerable Burundian refugees in eastern Rwanda.

The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) expresses gratitude to USAID/Food for Peace for the contribution of US$9 million to support food and nutrition assistance to Burundian and Democratic Republic Congolese refugees in Rwanda.

KIGALI – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) welcomed a US$6.5 million contribution from the United States of America in support of Congolese and Burundian refugees in Rwanda. This contribution restores full food rations to these refugees and brings the total food and nutrition assistance provided by USAID/Food for Peace in Rwanda to US$10 million this year.

KIGALI - The World Food Programme (WFP) and United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) appealed today to donors to contribute funds so that a 25 percent reduction from January onwards in food or cash assistance for more than 100,000 refugees in Rwanda can be reversed as soon as possible.

WASHINGTON, DC – The International Finance Corporation (IFC) and the Global Agriculture and Food Security Program (GAFSP) are launching smallholder farmer financing programs with the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) to improve food security among vulnerable people in Rwanda and Tanzania.

Kigali: The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) today expressed gratitude to Japan for its latest contribution of 165 million Japanese Yen (US$ 1.46 million), which will be used to provide food and nutrition assistance to over 55,000 Burundian refugees residing in Mahama refugee camp and reception centres. The official handover ceremony took place today at the WFP compound in Kigali.

YOKOHAMA – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) today welcomed a US$21.6 million cash contribution from the Government of Japan to provide vital food and nutrition assistance to the most vulnerable people in 11 countries, with 90 percent of the contribution going to 10 African nations.

NAIROBI – A new study conducted in Rwanda has found that humanitarian assistance for refugees has a positive impact on the economies of surrounding host communities, and this impact is significantly greater when refugees receive cash transfers rather than food rations to meet their monthly food needs.

KIGALI – A new study conducted by the Rwandan Ministry of Agriculture and the World Food Programme (WFP) indicates that rates of chronic malnutrition in Rwanda have fallen significantly in the last three years, but still remain stubbornly high, especially in rural areas.

DAVOS – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) today announced an important agreement which is the next step towards unlocking opportunities for smallholder farmers in the developing world.

The Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) has committed to further support the multi-sectoral programme aimed at fighting chronic malnutrition in the most food insecure districts of Nyamagabe and Rutsiro located in south and western provinces respectively. The four UN agencies involved in the SDC-supported project are the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the World Health Organization (WHO) and WFP.

ROME – The World Food Programme (WFP) is joining other organizations and agencies around the globe in advance of World Humanitarian Day on 19 August to bring attention to the heroes who risk their lives every day to help people in need.

WFP marks the International day of Co-operatives and commits to invest in capacity building of small-holder farmers through local purchases to achieve sustainable food security.

ROME/KIGALI– The UN World Food Programme (WFP) is marking World Food Day on 16 October by highlighting the power of nutrition to transform individuals, societies and economies, and the need to make it central to all development efforts.

ROME – The UN World Food Programme’s Executive Director Ertharin Cousin is scheduled to depart tomorrow on a 10-day visit to four African countries. Her trip to Zimbabwe, South Africa, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda will focus on hunger challenges and on WFP-supported local solutions that are helping battle under nutrition and build sustainable food security.