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MOZAMBIQUE / CYCLONE IDAI BEASLEY
STORY: MOZAMBIQUE / CYCLONE IDAI BEASLEY
TRT: 2:50
SOURCE: WFP
RESTRICTIONS: PLEASE CREDIT WFP ON SCREEN
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS
DATELINE: 24-26 MARCH 2019, BEIRA, MOZAMBIQUE
24 MARCH 2019, BEIRA, MOZAMBIQUE
1. Aerial shots, of flooded fields that were struck by Cyclone Idai.
26 MARCH 2019, BUZI TOWN
2. Aerial shots, flooded town
26 MARCH 2019, BEIRA, MOZAMBIQUE
3. WFP Executive Director David Beasley on board WFP Helicopter
26 MARCH 2019, GUARRA GUARRA VILLAGE, MOZAMBIQUE
4.SOUNDBITE (English) David Beasley, Executive Director, World Food Programme
“We need financial support from the international community. These people’s lives have been devasted, they have no livelihoods now, they’ve lost their homes, they’ve lost their farms, they’ve lost their crops they’ve lost loved ones. And they’re going to need help at least for the next 6 months to 12 months to get their feet back on the ground. Schools were lost, children are just devastated, families are wiped out with everything that they had, and now it’s going to be a time for rebuilding.”
5. Various shots, village struck by cyclone
25 MARCH 2019, GOONDA VILLAGE, MOZAMBIQUE
6. Various shots, helicopter hovering over muddy terrain and delivering aid.
25 MARCH 2019, BEIRA, MOZAMBIQUE
7.Various shots, families living in the school
8.SOUNDBITE (Portuguese) Delfina, local resident:
“First the roof collapsed, then the walls, then all house came down. I have lost everything, food, clothes.”
9. Various shots, people living in school
25 MARCH 2019, MAFAMBISSE, MOZAMBIQUE
10.Aerial shot, man pushing bike on flooded road
At the end of a two-day visit to Mozambique, the Executive Director of the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP), David Beasley said the international community must step up support to victims of the recent cyclone and flooding that have devastated large areas of the country.
After arriving Tuesday (26 Mar) in Beira, which was struck by Cyclone Idai on March 14, hitting the port city of half a million people, Beasley overflew the nearby town of Buzi – which had been all but submerged by raging floodwaters – and met survivors receiving airlifted WFP assistance in the isolated village of Guara Guara.
SOUNDBITE (English) David Beasley, Executive Director, World Food Programme:
“We need financial support from the international community. These people’s lives have been devasted, they have no livelihoods now, they’ve lost their homes, they’ve lost their farms, they’ve lost their crops they’ve lost loved ones. And they’re going to need help at least for the next 6 months to 12 months to get their feet back on the ground. Schools were lost, children are just devastated, families are wiped out with everything that they had, and now it’s going to be a time for rebuilding.”
An estimated 400,000 hectares of crops – primarily maize – were washed away just weeks ahead of the main April–May harvest. Other key sources of income, like livestock and fisheries, have also been badly affected.
Victims will need sustained support until they can get back on their feet – in the case of subsistence farmers, until the next main harvest in mid-2020.
The disaster has demonstrated how vulnerable communities are to climate shocks and will inevitably push up already high malnutrition rates.
Since the cyclone hit, WFP has provided food assistance to more than 150,000 people, intends to reach half a million in the coming weeks, and, as soon as possible, all 1.7 million people urgently in need of food.
Displaced cyclone victims sheltering in scores of schools and churches in Beira and surrounding areas have received easy-to-prepare fortified blended food. Sixty metric tons of high energy biscuits airlifted into the country have been dropped by helicopter to people stranded by the floodwaters.
With 86,000 metric tons of commodities needed in the next three months, WFP is procuring large quantities of cereals, vegetable oil and fortified blended foods elsewhere in southern Africa, and shipping and trucking them into Mozambique. As conditions permit, WFP will increase local procurement.
As lead of the global humanitarian logistics “cluster” that helps coordinate the relief effort, WFP has deployed to Beira three MI-8 transport helicopters and a freight aircraft to support the broader humanitarian response. As lead of the emergency telecommunications cluster, WFP has been working to re-establish vital networks that can accelerate the response by government and humanitarian agencies.
Almost 60 additional WFP staff have been deployed to Mozambique, and 45 more are on the way: emergency coordinators, air operations managers and programming, logistics and telecommunications experts.
WFP requires US$140 million for the next three months.
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