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WFP / YEMEN HUMANITARIAN
STORY: WFP / YEMEN HUMANITARIAN
TRT: 02:21
SOURCE: WFP
RESTRICTIONS: PLEASE CREDIT WFP ON SCREEN
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / ARABIC / NATS
DATELINE: 17-24 FEBRUARY 2022, MOKHA / SANA’A, YEMEN
17 FEBRUARY 2022, MOKHA, YEMEN
1. Various shots, Hamoud camp for displaced people
2. Various shots, Ali, father of two, preparing a meal, mixing bread with yoghurt for his family
3. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Ali, Displaced Father of Two:
“When there is no flour, you can't sleep. I get lost thinking about what to do and how to bring food home.
4. Close up, plate of food being prepared
5. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Ali, Displaced Father of Two:
“Security is not about feeling safe from war, but it is about having food at your home. Security means having food and flour at your home to protect your family and children from hunger and everything else.”
24 FEBRUARY 2022, SANA’A, YEMEN
6. Various shots, Mothers with their children waiting for to be tested and treated for malnutrition in Bani Hawat Public Health Centre
7. Med shot, Katibah and her daughter getting medical attention
8. Med shot, WFP Executive Director David Beasley, with Katibah and her daughter
9. SOUNDBITE (English) David Beasley, Executive Director, World Food Programme (WFP):
“We are now running out of money and we are cutting literally 8 million people off of food support because we don’t have the support we need. Just when you think it can’t get any worse, now you’ve got Ukraine. And Ukraine is really going to cause economic deterioration around the world; oil prices, food prices.”
21 FEBRUARY 2022, MOKHA, YEMEN
10. Various shots, 7-year-old Ayham, being tested for malnutrition and receiving special nutritious food supplements from WFP
11. Various shots, Ayham eating WFP nutritious food supplements
12. Various shots, Ayham’s mother, Fatin and her children head home with WFP food
Yemen is spiraling into a catastrophe as humanitarian funding dries up, forcing the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) to scale back food assistance to millions of hungry families, WFP Executive Director David Beasley warned today (24 Feb) as he ended a two-day visit to the conflict-ravaged country.
WFP provides people living at Hamoud camp for displaced people with monthly food distributions.
Ali and his family fled from Al-Areesh three years ago, and they have since been living in Hamoud camp where they depend on WFP food to survive.
SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Ali, Displaced Father of Two:
“When there is no flour, you can't sleep. I get lost thinking about what to do and how to bring food home.
SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Ali, Displaced Father of Two:
“Security is not about feeling safe from war, but it is about having food at your home. Security means having food and flour at your home to protect your family and children from hunger and everything else.”
Bani Hawat Public Health Centre, is one of 70 health centres supported by WFP in Sana’a. In 2021, WFP provided 1,216 children under 5 and 1,363 women with nutritional support at this clinic.
Beasley met with government officials and spent time with families in hospitals and food distribution centers in Aden, Sana’a and Amran governorates. These governorates have alarming levels of food insecurity, with Amran even showing pockets of famine in the 2020 food security assessments.
The WFP chief heard first-hand about the impact of cuts in assistance on families’ lives. He spoke to Katibah, a mother caring for her severely malnourished child in an Amran hospital. She said she was displaced from Hajjah on the frontlines and could have stayed in her home had she received food for her children. Instead, she sold her furniture and sheep and took her children in search of food and safety.
Katibah’s daughter Sanaa Ahmed has been suffering from severe malnutrition since birth. Sanaa has 8 older siblings but her father is currently jobless so the family relies heavily on WFP food assistance to survive.
SOUNDBITE (English) David Beasley, Executive Director, World Food Programme (WFP):
“We are now running out of money and we are cutting literally 8 million people off of food support because we don’t have the support we need. Just when you think it can’t get any worse, now you’ve got Ukraine. And Ukraine is really going to cause economic deterioration around the world; oil prices, food prices.”
The escalation of conflict in Ukraine is likely to further increase fuel and food prices and especially grains in the import-dependent country. Food prices have more than doubled across much of Yemen over the past year, leaving more than half of the country in need of food assistance. Higher food prices will push more people into the vicious circle of hunger and dependence on humanitarian assistance.
WFP provides food assistance to 13 million people every month in Yemen, but was forced to halve food rations for eight million people at the beginning of the year due to a shortage of funding. Five million people who are at immediate risk of slipping into famine conditions have continued to receive a full food ration.
But without an immediate influx of cash, more severe reductions will be unavoidable and millions of hungry people may not receive food at all. For Yemenis, the timing could not be worse. As families try to put food on the table, they are being hampered by the knock-on effects of a serious escalation in fighting alongside the continuing deterioration of the economy.
WFP needs US$800 million in the next six months to provide full assistance to the 13 million people it has been assisting until now. Last year, WFP has delivered more than one million tons of food and over US$330 million in cash and voucher assistance to families across Yemen.
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