 |
Un
Seeks Us$2 Billion In International Aid For Africa's Sahel Region
Last update: 04/02/2014
ROME, Feb 4 (BERNAMA-NNN-
UNNS) -- The United Nations and its global humanitarian
partners appealed for US$2 billion on behalf of some 20 million people desperate
for food in Africa's Sahel region, where violence and insecurity has created
protracted internal displacement and where population growth is outstripping
food production.
"More people than ever are at risk in the Sahel and the scale of their needs is
so great that no agency or organization can tackle it alone," said Emergency
Relief Coordinator Valerie Amos at the launch in Rome. "The strategic plan for
the region will help us reach millions of people with vital assistance, build
resilience and save lives," she underscored.
The Sahel stretches from Mauritania in the west to Eritrea in the east, a vast
belt dividing the Sahara desert and the savannahs to the south, which has
undergone three major droughts in less than a decade and where more than 20
million people are at risk of hunger and an estimated 5 million children under
five are at risk of acute malnutrition.
"Our first priority is to ensure that farmers in the Sahel have a successful
planting season in the coming weeks, providing them urgently with agricultural
inputs," said UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) Director-General Jose
Graziano da Silva, adding that the overall goal is to build resilience of the
Sahelian population to prevent the next drought from becoming a major
humanitarian crisis.
In south-east Niger, for example, a convergence of floods, droughts and conflict
in neighbouring Nigeria means that people near the town of Diffa cannot grow
enough food to get by.
"We've had nothing to eat for ten days," Mohamed Dala told the UN Office for the
Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). "Before the floods I could at times
produce 50 bags of peppers as well as millet and maize."
The three-year strategy comprises country plans for Burkina Faso, Cameroon,
Chad, Gambia, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria and Senegal. It emphasizes strong
partnerships with Governments and development partners, a regional perspective
and multi-year time frame to better address the chronic causes of the crises.
On the sidelines of the UN General Assembly's high-level segment in September,
world leaders agreed that collective efforts in region must address urgent
humanitarian needs as well as long-term development and security threats, and
expressed support for a UN Integrated Strategy put forward by Romano Prodi, the
Secretary-General's Special Envoy for the Sahel.
The Strategy aims to bolster governance, security, humanitarian requirements and
development, while enhancing coordination in four spheres between the
governments of the region, between members of the international community,
reaching out and listening to the people of the Sahel, and within the UN system.
The region includes countries where fighting has forced some 1.2 million people
to flee, including in Mali, Nigeria, Sudan and the Central African Republic
(CAR), according the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
(OCHA) warned Monday.
Prodi, who participated in today's launch, has warned that the current global
economic climate and competing needs elsewhere in the world constricted both the
attention and funding required.
Of the $1.7 billion requested in the 2013 appeal for the region, donors were
only about to fund about 63 per cent. During a visit to the region last November
alongside Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim
pledged $1.5 billion in new regional investments over the next two years, in
additional to significant country programmes, while the European Union (EU) had
announced it will provide €5 billion ($6.75 billion) to six countries over the
next seven years.
"The situation requires an early and large-scale humanitarian response in almost
all countries of the Sahel," today said Kristalina Georgieva, European
Commissioner for International Cooperation, Humanitarian Aid and Crisis
Response.
"The European Commission will give €142 million in humanitarian aid in 2014.
More contributions from international donors are needed as soon as possible to
meet the basic needs of the people in the Sahel." -- BERNAMA-NNN-UNNS
MHS |
|
|
<Back> |
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| OPENING, TUESDAY, MAR 9| US | 4.1180/1230 | | S'pore | 3.0479/0520 | | 100 Yen | 3.7752/7805 | | Sterling | 5.6882/6967 | | Euro | 4.8769/8833 |
Source: Bank Negara Malaysia |
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
