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Korean peninsula: WFP welcomes South’s donation to hungry in North

Korean peninsula: WFP welcomes South’s donation to hungry in North

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The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) today welcomed a 100,000-ton donation of maize from the Republic of Korea to the agency’s emergency operation providing aid to 6.5 million vulnerable people in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK).

“We are deeply grateful for this generous contribution,” WFP Executive Director James Morris said in Seoul. “It will allow us to continue providing vital, supplemental rations to the neediest of the needy in North Korea through the harsh winter.”

On Thursday Mr. Morris met Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon, and held talks with a number of Korean business executives. “We are keen to enlist the support of individuals and companies in your dynamic private sector for our work in North Korea, where it costs just $26 to feed a child for a year,” he said.

The Republic of Korean is the world’s 12th largest economy, and is already a significant WFP donor. Since 1999 it has pledged $51.2 million to the agency, making life-saving contributions to emergency operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and West and southern Africa.

Mr. Morris acknowledged that the substantial food assistance Seoul’s pledges bilaterally to the DPRK – including 1.2 million tons of rice in the form of concessional loans since 2002 – helps preserve peace on the peninsula. “We still face a range of frustrating access and monitoring restrictions in the North, but [WFP] remains the best assurance that food aid intended for the most needy children, women and elderly people there actually reaches them.”

The agency implements a strict “no access, no food” policy, with assistance provided only to the 161 out of 203 counties and districts, accounting for 85 per cent of the 23 million population, where staff can monitor.

Prior to today’s pledge by Seoul, WFP had secured just 54 per cent of the $171 million needed to help feed the most vulnerable Koreans in the north this year, and was forced to drop many of them from its distribution plans for long periods during the year.

The operation targets primarily those most affected by a lack of dietary balance and those who have no means of meeting their minimum caloric or micronutrient requirements. It also seeks to assist households most negatively affected by the country’s economic adjustment process.