Wednesday, September 03, 2008

UN plans major food relief program to North Korea

The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) announced today that it is launching a major relief campaign to help more than 6 million people in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), which is experiencing its worst food crisis in a decade.

Nearly $8 million will be needed every week to meet emergency food needs. In total, WFP expects it will have to spend around $500 million to fight off widespread hunger, where a combination of successive poor harvests, soaring food prices, reduced imports and the effect of flooding last year have an estimated 6.2 million people in need.

The agency plans to deploy an additional 59 staff across the country to support the newly expanded operation.

Today’s announcement follows an assessment mission by staff with WFP and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) in June, which found that more than three quarters of all households in the country had reduced their food intake and at least half were eating only two meals a day.

[UN]

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