Sections:
UK announces further £1.5m for humanitarian relief in Niger
Press Release,11 June, 2006
DFID will provide an
additional £1.5 million to Niger, the world’s poorest country, to help prevent a
repetition of last year’s food crisis, Hilary Benn, International Development
Secretary, announced today. The funding will be provided to the UN and NGOs who
are working on continuing relief operations in the country.
On the back of reasonable food production, the situation is more stable than in
2005, with the humanitarian community far better placed, and resourced to
respond effectively to emergency needs. However, the legacy from the 2005 crisis
suggests that up to 1.8 million people could still face acute food shortages in
the coming months, and up to 380,000 children in Niger could require nutritional
therapy this year.
International Development Secretary Hilary Benn said:
“Although the international effort last year succeeded in preventing a major catastrophe, the legacy of that crisis, coupled with longer-term chronic challenges in Niger, suggest we may still need a sizeable humanitarian effort as we enter the difficult lean season.
“While our monitoring of the situation in Niger does not show the same dramatic or widespread deterioration that we saw at this time last year, the international community must not forget the tragic circumstances that the country continues to face.
“It is essential that we help reduce children’s nutritional vulnerability and increase access to health and nutritional care for Niger’s poorest. By helping to strengthen NGOs’ capacity to identify and treat children early in many affected areas, we hope we will be able to help avert the devastating consequences of malnutrition and prevent needless loss of life.
“I urge other donors to come in and help the world’s poorest country.”
Today’s announcement will see the UK commit an additional £1,500,000 to support partners’ nutritional interventions. This is on top of £2 million already allocated for 2006 that is supporting a variety of response, recovery and mitigation projects.
Additionally, the wider Sahel region, including Mali and Burkina Faso, will receive a multi-annual budget of £500,000 per year for the next three years to tackle longer-term nutritional vulnerabilities. DFID will continue to monitor the humanitarian situation closely in the countries, where current emergency needs and the risk of deterioration are judged to be more manageable, but where chronic nutritional vulnerabilities pose similar threats to the poorest through the hungry season.
Notes to editors
1. Today’s announcement brings the total UK humanitarian contribution to Niger to £3.5 million in 2006. Last year, DFID committed £3.9 million to the Sahel crisis, making it the 3rd largest bi-lateral donor.
2. According to the most recent UN Human Development Report (2005), Niger is the poorest country in the world with over 60% of the population living on less than one dollar a day.
3. DFID assistance to Niger focuses on three main areas – girls’ education, humanitarian assistance and debt relief. In January 2006, Niger received 100% debt cancellation from the IMF under the G8’s Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative. The UK has also cancelled 100% of Niger’s outstanding bilateral debt.
4. The UK, via France’s development cooperation programme in Niger, is already providing a £7 million grant to promote girls’ primary education over the next three years and which seeks to address, in the longer term, some of the gender-based issues that have contributed to poverty, vulnerability and the recent crisis.
For further information please call 020 7023 0600 or e-mail
pressoffice@dfid.gov.uk
or call our Public Enquiries Point on 0845 300 4100.