The World Food Programme has issued an appeal for more than US$230 million to provide emergency food assistance over the next six months to 3.8 million Kenyans.
The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP)
wants the funds to assist Kenyans who have been affected by deepening drought and continued high food prices.The following email interview was recently conducted with WFP spokesperson Julie Marshall
BE- One of the questions I often hear regarding food aid is how do we know the food reaches the people for whom it is intended? In the case of this appeal for Kenya what measures is the WFP taking to ensure the aid arrives where it is most needed?
JM- The World Food Programme has a system that aims to provide food directly to women and heads of families. People are registered before the food is delivered and there's post-distribution monitoring to ensure it has been used by those it was intended for.
BE- Why is the need so great in Kenya today and who is most affected by the food shortages?
JM- Kenya was already struggling because of drought, high food prices and the global financial crisis. Falling remittances [money sent back to family] mean hundreds of thousands more people were struggling to find enough food even before the failure of the annual long rains.
BE- Besides Kenya what other countries are in desperate need of food aid and what is the WFP doing to meet the need?
JM- Pastoralist communities are particularly affected, forced to migrate large distances with their cattle in search of water and pasture. Also young children, over 20 percent in some areas are suffering with acute malnutrition.
Millions of people in the Horn of Africa face a deadly mix of persistent drought, poor seasonal rains, conflict and stubbornly high food costs. At the same time, the global financial crisis is threatening to exacerbate levels of hunger and desperation across the region.
WFP is currently providing food assistance to 17 million people in the Horn of Africa region. But funding for many of its operations is low at a time when the numbers of hungry people in Somalia, Kenya, Ethiopia, northern Uganda and Djibouti are expected to rise.
WFP is appealing for more than US$230 million to provide emergency food assistance over the next six months to 3.8 million Kenyans. Also, WFP is expanding its school meals programme by 100,000 to reach nearly 1.2 million children in the worst affected areas in Kenya
