UN World Food Programme (WFP)

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UN World Food Programme (WFP)

The World Food Programme (WFP) is the leading humanitarian organization saving lives and changing lives, delivering food assistance in emergencies and working with communities to improve nutrition and build resilience.

September 1962, northern Iran. An earthquake strikes the area of Boein Zahra. More than 12,000 people die. Thousands of houses are destroyed.

Cataclysmic for its victims, the tremor is also a baptism of fire for the World Food Programme: the institution has only existed for a matter of months. Even so, it quickly sends survivors 1,500 metric tons of wheat, 270 tons of sugar and 27 tons of tea.

Created in 1961 (at the behest of US President Dwight Eisenhower) as an experiment to provide food aid through the UN system, WFP is to be reassessed within three years. As crises multiply, the experiment proves its worth. A typhoon makes landfall in Thailand.

Newly independent Algeria must repatriate and feed its war refugees. In every case, WFP rises to the task. Its mission is emergency aid, but also rehabilitation. A first development programme is launched in 1963 for Nubians in Sudan.

ORGANIZATIONAL CONTEXT:

The hunger crisis in Afghanistan is unfolding at a rapidly, with over half the country’s population of 40 million now facing acute food insecurity—the highest number the humanitarian community has ever seen in Afghanistan. Work opportunities are shrinking, with most households now reporting just one day of work per week.

This comes on top of the worst drought in years, which is especially concerning for the 85 percent of the population who rely on agriculture for livelihoods.

Preventing and mitigating a drastic increase in hunger and malnutrition is the aim of WFP in Afghanistan which can only be achieved through the scaled up and sustained complementary food security and nutrition interventions, combined with a scale-up of resilience interventions to safeguard gains.

WFP has embarked on a significant month on month scale-up of its crisis response and resilience programmes across the country, ensuring that the programme is delivered at the right scale and time, targeted to the right areas. WFP is also actively following up on evolving trends to pre-empt hotspots, while guaranteeing quality and maximum impact of the programme through the monitoring of these hotspots to be able to support continued donor advocacy.

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FOOD AND AGRICULTURE ORGANIZATION(FAO)