S.Africa on Food Shortage

Representatives from governments and aid agencies as well as some donors attended a two-day meeting that opened in Johannesburg Thursday to discuss food shortages inthe Southern African Development Community (SADC) countries.

According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the objectives of the meeting are to discussthe preliminary results of the inter-agency assessments, such as the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), the World Food Program (WFP) and the Crop Supply Assessments (CSA).

The assessments are expected to enable the countries to gain a deeper understanding of the worsening humanitarian situation in general and the food crisis in particular.

These assessments are being completed and it is important to meet to discuss implementation of their findings as well as to ensure that the humanitarian community takes a coherent regional approach.

The meeting follows the decision taken at the UN Inter-Agency Standing Committee Working Group (IASC-WG) meeting in March this year to request Judith Lewis, the World Food Program's Regional Director for East and Southern Africa, to coordinate a series of multi-sector assessments in the affected countries.

Delegates from Lesotho, Malawi, Angola, Swaziland, Mozambique, Zambia, Botswana, Zimbabwe and South Africa attended the meeting.

(Xinhua News Agency June 7, 2002)