UN relief coordinator urges strong response to appeal for Afghanistan

The head of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) today urged "a strong and quick response" to an appeal for Afghanistan, where an estimated $800,000 per day will be needed for the relief effort this year.

UN Emergency Relief Coordinator Kenzo Oshima made his call at a donors' meeting in Islamabad, which came on the heels of a two-day conference organized by the UN Development Programme (UNDP) and the World Bank to explore ways of bringing analytical work more into the mainstream of assistance programmes for Afghanistan. The results of the conference were forwarded to the donors' meeting to send messages that were "grounded in reality and informed by analytical work," OCHA said in a statement.

The conference marked the completion of the joint UNDP/World Bank project, "Afghanistan Watching Brief," and brought together a wide range of experts, as well as ambassadors from Japan, Italy, Sweden, and Norway.

The participants discussed studies on Afghanistan's international trade relations and on the socio-economic impact of mine action, along with findings of earlier workshops and conferences on basic education, health service delivery and food security strategies.

At the conclusion, UN, donor and non-governmental representatives urged the World Bank to expand the range of its analytical works in partnership with UNDP and embark on a second phase of the "Watching Brief" strategy.