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Federal Foreign Office aid package for Niger

Countries
Niger
Sources
Govt. Germany
Publication date

The Federal Foreign Office has made available a further 1 million euro for humanitarian relief operations to help famine victims in Niger.

Part of this sum will be used to fund humanitarian aid projects run by German non-governmental organizations in Niger, especially therapeutic and supplementary feeding programmes for children, elderly people and other particularly vulnerable groups. Plans are likewise to be drawn up for dealing with possible further outbreaks of cholera.

Part of the funds will also be used to support the work of international aid agencies. To this end the Federal Foreign Office is currently holding discussions with the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund UNICEF, whose latest updated appeal was issued on 28 July. UNICEF plans to concentrate its aid primarily on the approx. 32,000 severely undernourished children in Niger.

Currently some 3.6 million of Niger's 12 million population are facing severe food shortages. The current crisis is the result of periodic drought as well as the locust plague that devastated crops especially in Niger and neighbouring countries last year.

Already on 1 June the Federal Government warned that Niger was facing famine. Since then the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development has made available some 1.5 million euro in humanitarian emergency aid.