In the largest food aid operation in history, the World Food Programme (WFP) expects to bring 2.2 million tonnes of food into Iraq by October 2003. Expressing the magnitude of the situation, WFP Deputy Executive Director for Operations, Jean-Jacques Graisse said: "A throughput of over 1,000 tonnes per hour, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, sustained for a month is unheard of!"
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| The biscuits, made from flour enriched with micronutrients, offer a vital source of protein and nutrition to refugees, often exhausted after travelling for days without food. Photo/WFP/Marco Ling |
Although it is the world's largest humanitarian agency, having fed 72 million people in 82 countries in 2002, WFP is faced with particular challenge with an extremely complex logistical and transport operation, which is affected by the security situation, where increase in shootings, looting of storage facilities and attacks on trucks bringing in food have occurred. But "distributions under the Public Distribution System are proceeding smoothly", WFP reported in a 25 July Emergency Report, adding that they were "almost completed". Overall dispatches into Iraq since the beginning of the operation in April total 1,594,446 tonnes; the total for July was 352,535 tonnes.
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| WFP convoy makes the 15 km journey from the Turkish town of Silopi to the Iraqi border, ready to open a food aid corridor into the Kurdish-controlled Northern Governorates. Photo/WFP/Chris Eades |
Until the end of October, WFP will continue to support the Iraqi Ministry of Trade in running the food rationing system in the country. Before the war, 60 per cent of the 27 million residents relied on food handouts as their only source of income. Each 18-kilogram ration consists of basic food commodities, such as wheat flour, rice, sugar, pulses and vegetable oil, and cost 250 Iraqi Dinar, or about $0.20. By October, the amount of food commodities brought into Iraq will equal the total amount of food WFP distributed worldwide last year. Fortunately, the operation is almost fully funded: the Oil-For-Food Programme is expected to cover about two thirds of the $1.5 billion budget and donors have contributed another third, approximately $535 million, according to WFP. |
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