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Haiti: WFP Boosts Food Aid but Stocks Run Low

  • Instability caused by armed gangs is again threatening humanitarian work along with access to essential services such as health, education or mobility. Apr. 12, 2024.

    Instability caused by armed gangs is again threatening humanitarian work along with access to essential services such as health, education or mobility. Apr. 12, 2024. | Photo: X/@WFP_es

Published 12 April 2024
Opinion

The program has so far reached more than half a million people with emergency assistance, including hot meals for people living in temporary shelters in the Haitian capital.

On Friday, the World Food Programme (WFP) today announced an increase in its assistance in Haiti but said its stocks could be depleted by the end of this month due to difficulties in getting supplies into the country.

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The United Nations agency warned that it only has enough food to reach 175,000 Haitians in the remainder of April, which would mean the paralysis of one of the main humanitarian actors in the country heavily affected by violence.

The closure of the nation's main port and airport in Port-au-Prince for the past month or so has disrupted the flow of supplies, Secretary-General António Guterres' spokesman Stéphane Dujarric said Thursday.

The program has so far reached more than half a million people with emergency assistance, including hot meals for people living in temporary shelters in the Haitian capital.

It has also provided cash assistance and school meals in the provinces.

The tweet reads, "Mobilizing 15 metric tons of opsoms inputs to respond to the crisis in Haiti. With funding from eu_ECHO , WFP , through LogCluster and UNHR , are synchronizing efforts to ensure efficient delivery of this cargo."

However, instability caused by armed gangs is again threatening humanitarian work along with access to essential services such as health, education or mobility.

The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) warned today of the impact of gangs on Haitians' access to health care in Port-au-Prince, where major institutions remain closed or affected.

The State University Hospital has not provided services since the end of March, while La Paix Hospital, the largest functioning public facility, remains overwhelmed.

Staff and ambulances are also having difficulty accessing gang-controlled areas, OCHA added.

Since 1 March, the UN Children's Fund, the International Organization for Migration and their partners have delivered more than 4.5 million liters of clean water to 29 sites in the capital.

For their part, entities such as the World Health Organization and the UN Population Fund continue to support hospitals with equipment and medicines, but overall the humanitarian response is underfunded with less than seven percent of the plan to support the country having been raised.

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