UN agency begins food distribution in remote Nepali villages

 ,TNN | Apr 29, 2015

NEW DELHI: Food trucks commissioned by the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) started rolling out into the remote villages of one of the most severely affected Gorkha district of Nepal. WFP, which is the largest humanitarian agency in the world, plans to provide food for 1.4 million people in urgent need of assistance over the next three months at a cost of $116.5 million.

It is estimated that up to 8 million people have been affected by the earthquake. That is more than a quarter of the country's population. The affected eight million people live in 39 districts of Nepal. Of these, two million people are in the 11 severely affected districts.

Initial estimates from WFP's assessment teams — working with satellite imagery and existing data — indicate that around 1.4 million people in priority areas urgently need food assistance. Five teams are now conducting field assessments in 11 districts to verify these findings.

On Tuesday, the head of the United Nations Development Programme in Nepal told Reuters that Kathmandu had told aid agencies it did not need more foreign rescue teams because its government and military could cope.

WFP has said that landslides and poor roads are making conditions difficult in Gorkha district as aid workers try to reach stricken villages deep in the mountains.

"A helicopter will fly to the area to transport food onwards to more remote villages that are inaccessible by road. Emergency food supplies, including high-energy biscuits, are also being brought in by air from Bangladesh and Dubai in the next days," a WFP statement said Wednesday.

A plane from the WFP-managed UN Humanitarian Response Depot in Malaysia arrived in Kathmandu this morning carrying field hospitals, medical supplies and aid workers.

"Time is of the essence to get food to those who urgently needed it," said Pippa Bradford, WFP's Country Director and Representative in Nepal.

In addition to food distributions, as the lead of the humanitarian community's Logistics Cluster, WFP is also providing logistics support for the entire aid operation in Nepal.

WFP hopes to have two helicopters operational in the coming days to transport both humanitarian cargo and aid workers to the worst-affected areas.

At Tribhuvan International Airport in Kathmandu, WFP is operating a relief hub for the management and dispatch of the cargo flooding into the country. This Humanitarian Staging Area was opened last month as part of WFP's emergency preparedness work with the government of Nepal, which has been focusing on preparing for such an emergency for several years now. As co-lead of the Emergency Telecommunications Cluster, WFP is also facilitating the humanitarian community's communications systems.

In order to support logistics, telecommunications and air transport operations for the entire humanitarian community, WFP will need US$34 million over the next three months.
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