IDPs / Mozambique: USAID seeks funding for humanitarian aid to Nampula province

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IDPs / Mozambique: USAID seeks funding for humanitarian aid to Nampula province

11:55 CAT | 23 Feb 2021

FILE - Corrane. For illustration purposes only. [File photo: O País]

The US Agency for International Development (USAID) has been involved in negotiations with its partners in an attempt to ensure further funding for the three humanitarian assistance projects under way in the northern Mozambican province of Nampula, which are implemented by the United Nations.

The three projects cover food aid, improved housing construction and poultry farming. They are budgeted at five million US dollars to the end of June.

Speaking on Monday to reporters, after a meeting with Mety Gondola, the Secretary of State for Nampula, USAID regional adviser John Grabowski said the agency is holding talks with its partners in order to see the possibility of an extension of the projects.

“The total amount disbursed for the three projects will reach five million dollars,” Grabowski said, pointing out that food assistance for internally displaced people from the neighbouring province of Cabo Delgado is the first project and is under the supervision of the World Food Programme (WFP).

Under the second project, overseen by the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), 500 improved houses have been under construction since August 2019 in the coastal district of Memba. The plan started shortly after tropical cyclone Kenneth struck Cabo Delgado and Nampula in April 2019.

Grabowski said the third project consists of direct support to the internally displaced households living in Nampula for poultry farming. “About 1,500 families have received chickens and the project will continue over the next few months with the chicken vaccination drive,” he said.

Gondola stressed that the projects must include the host communities, as well as the displaced, in order to avoid stigma.

“Our approach is social integration and not the creation of a special social group that will run every sort of danger of stigmatisation”, Gondola cautioned. “We would like to ensure that the host communities can also benefit”.

He praised the poultry farming project since it will provide added value in the fight against the malnutrition affecting the province. Nampula, hosting 64,000 displaced people, has the country’s highest rate of chronic malnutrition currently standing at 51 per cent.

Source: AIM