WFP Executive Director to meet with PA officials – WFP press release

WFP Executive Director Attends Israeli Conference, Visits Innovative Food Assistance Programme In Palestine

JERUSALEM – The Executive Director of the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP), Ertharin Cousin, will be in Israel and the State of Palestine this week to attend a conference and visit WFP operations.

She arrives in Jerusalem today and  will take part tomorrow (Wednesday 19 June) in a panel discussion at the Israeli Presidential Conference entitled “Is There Hope for a Green Tomorrow?” She will give a lecture at Tel Aviv University and visit the Volcani Institute of Agricultural Research as well as meeting government officials.

Cousin will meet officials of the Palestinian Authority on Thursday 20 June. She will attend a food distribution on Friday 21 June at a Bedouin village between Jerusalem and Jericho and see WFP’s innovative electronic food voucher programme. WFP reaches approximately 650,000 food-insecure, non-refugee households, in the West Bank and Gaza.

A third of all households in Palestine, or 1.6 million people, struggle to feed their families. Food insecurity is a major challenge and 2012 saw a steep rise in the number of “food-insecure” people.

WFP’s programmes support local production and economic activity. In the past three years US$100 million was injected into the Palestinian economy through the use of electronic vouchers and local purchase of Palestinian food products. 

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WFP is the world's largest humanitarian agency fighting hunger worldwide.  Each year WFP feeds more than 90 million people in more than 70 countries.

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For more information, or for journalists who wish to request an interview or to accompany the Executive Director on a field visit, please contact (email address: firstname.lastname@wfp.org):

Jane Howard, WFP/Jerusalem, Mob. +972 (0)546 773168 and +39 346 7600 521
Anna Trolle-Lindgren, WFP/Jerusalem, Tel. +972 (0)2540 1340/1/2, ext. 2210, Mob, (0)546 773128