UN World Food Programme in talks with India for wheat donation to Afghan

Amidst a dire humanitarian situation in Afghanistan, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) is in discussions with India for donating wheat to the war-torn country which is now under the control of the Taliban.

Representative and Country Director of WFP Afghanistan Mary-Ellen McGroarty, responding to a question during a virtual press conference on whether the UN World Food Programme has approached India for donating more wheat to Afghanistan this year, said: Yeah, I mean as far as I’m aware it’s a conversation that’s going on with my office locally in India.

This conversation has been going on for a couple of weeks now. So hopefully we can bring that to a good conclusion and hopefully would see another donation coming in because again as I said, there’s a wheat deficit of 2.5 million tons this year in Afghanistan. So, really we need all the help we can get, she said on Wednesday.

Last year, India had donated 75,000 metric tons of wheat as aid for Afghan citizens. The wheat had come through the Chabahar port.

The Indian Embassy in Kabul had said in November last year that the shipment of wheat was supplied to Afghanistan in 10 installments between April and September 2020, through Chabahar, with the aim of assisting Afghanistan in augmenting its food security during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

This food grains assistance is part of India’s humanitarian and economic assistance program. The large-scale deliveries from India to Afghanistan via Chabahar Port also demonstrates the salience and economic viability of the Chabahar Port for Afghanistan’ trade and commerce, the Indian mission had said.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said in a statement that UN agencies and humanitarian NGOs in Afghanistan are in a race against time to deliver life-saving aid to crisis-affected people and preposition supplies ahead of winter.

Millions of people in Afghanistan have been deeply affected by decades of conflict and displacement, chronic poverty, the COVID-19 pandemic, a severe drought, a failing health system, and an economy on the brink of collapse. The rights of women and girls, and of minorities in Afghanistan, are seriously under threat, it said.

McGroarty said that Afghanistan is on borrowed time. In my long career with WFP, I’ve never before seen a crisis unfold at this pace and scale. We are witnessing a new depth of destitution as the drought and the economic crisis drives up food and fuel prices. Getting food to families across Afghanistan before the cold and harsh winter is what we must do now!

In September, over 3.8 million people received food aid, 21,000 children aged 6-59 months and 10,000 women got treatment for acute malnutrition, 32,000 people non-food items including blankets and warm clothes, 10,000 children were reached with community-based education activities, 450,000 people with healthcare, 160,000 farmers and herders were provided with livelihood support, 12,000 people got emergency psycho-social and mental health support, 186,000 drought-affected received water and 150,000 people got hygiene promotion and hygiene kits, the UN agency said.

At the beginning of 2021, the humanitarian situation in Afghanistan was already one of the worst in the world, with nearly half of the population some 18.4 million people in need of humanitarian assistance.

Conflict and insecurity have displaced nearly 700,000 people within the county this year, with more than 3.5 million Afghans uprooted by conflict in total.

Existing needs and vulnerabilities have deepened following recent events, and economic shocks are tipping more people in Afghanistan into crisis.

On September 13 this year, the humanitarian community launched the Afghanistan Flash Appeal, calling for USD 606 million to provide priority life-saving aid to 10.8 million of the most vulnerable people in need by the end of the year.

Despite the outpouring of support and global attention to the dire situation in Afghanistan, the flash appeal remains only 35 per cent funded, the agency said.

Pledges and commitments by donors must urgently be turned into reality to ensure humanitarian organisations can respond before it is too late. UN member states are requested to allow the swift and unfettered movement of humanitarian supplies and personnel into and out of Afghanistan, and to provide humanitarian financial exemptions to allow funds to reach aid organizations in the country, the UN agency added.

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