The United Kingdom has announced a £15 million emergency humanitarian funding to provide vital food and nutritional assistance for vulnerable people in the North-East Nigerian states of Borno, Adamawa and Yobe.
The support is coming at a time when food items are in short supply leading to the increase in their prices.
The money will fund the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and World Food Programme (WFP) to deliver life-saving activities to respond to crisis and emergency levels of food insecurity and malnutrition for vulnerable people, including malnourished women and children.
The food assistance funding is part of the UK’s wider commitment to prioritise life-saving humanitarian aid to communities around the world who are most vulnerable due to the ongoing combination of crises.
Acting British High Commissioner to Nigeria, Gill Atkinson said the continued conflict has led 4.1 million people to face a food crisis in North-East Nigeria and the £15 million humanitarian assistance will help to tackle food insecurity and malnutrition among the region’s most vulnerable people, including women and children”.
“This life-saving aid will help stave off starvation and support people to become more resilient”, he said.
The UK is proud to be supporting the work of our delivery partners – the World Food Programme and UNICEF – whose aid workers put themselves at great risk in order to reach those suffering most. The humanitarian assistance in North-East Nigeria will be delivered through both the UNICEF (the United Nations Children’s Fund) and WFP (World Food Programme).
This emergency funding supports the UK’s work alongside the Nigerian government to build security in the face of growing instability in the north of the country.
The UK has also announced further humanitarian funding to several West African countries in the Sahel region including Mali, Burkina Faso, Chad and Niger. When combined with the £15 million funding allocated to North-East Nigeria, this humanitarian funding totals £37.65 million.
Minister for Africa, Vicky Ford said millions of people across the Sahel and West Africa including Mali, Burkina Faso, Chad and Niger are unimaginably suffering from hunger and malnutrition and that’s why the UK will step up with an urgent £38 million of humanitarian funding, reaching those most vulnerable and saving lives across the region.
“The number of people facing starvation is at their worst for a decade. Whilst this UK funding is a necessity, it has to be part of a bigger international effort. We are calling on international partners to enhance our collective support and scale-up intervention to halt this humanitarian catastrophe.”
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