The heads of the World Food Programme (WFP) and the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, urgently appealed for extra funding on Tuesday. In a joint press release, they warn that funding difficulties, compounded by security and logistical problems in some countries, have forced cuts in food rations for nearly 800,000 refugees in Africa.<\/p>\n
Addressing government representatives at a meeting in Geneva, the WFP head and the UNHCR commissioner made an urgent joint plea for $186 million to allow WFP to restore full rations and prevent further reductions elsewhere through December 2014. For its part, UNHCR needs $39 million for nutrition support to malnourished and vulnerable refugees in Africa.<\/p>\n
Supplies have been cut by at least 50 percent for nearly 450,000 refugees in remote camps and other sites in the Central African Republic, Chad, and South Sudan. Another 338,000 refugees in Liberia, Burkina Faso, Mozambique, Ghana, Mauritania, and Uganda have seen their rations reduced by between five and 43 percent.<\/p>\n
Unacceptable malnutrition levels<\/strong><\/p>\n The cuts threaten to worsen already unacceptable levels of acute malnutrition, stunting and anaemia, particularly in children. Generally, WFP tries to provide 2,100 kilocalories per refugee per day. Even small cuts can spell disaster for already undernourished people. The impact, especially on children, can be immediate and often irreversible.<\/p>\n Malnutrition during a child\u2019s first 1,000 days from conception compromises both physical growth and mental development. Numerous studies have shown that this \u201cstunting\u201d leaves affected children at a severe social and economic disadvantage for the rest of their lives.<\/p>\n Nutritional surveys conducted between 2011 and 2013 showed that stunting and anaemia among children was already at critical levels in the majority of the refugee sites.<\/p>\n File photo: A child eats lentils in a food distribution centre <\/em>run by the WFP <\/em>in Rwanda camp, North Darfur, March 2014 (Albert Gonz\u00e1lez Farran\/Unamid)<\/em><\/p>\n