01 Aug The Somalia’s ministry humanitarian welcoming China’s rice assistance to Somalia

MOGADISHU, Aug. 1, The Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Disaster Management of Somalia (MoHADM) on Tuesday held a hand-over ceremony, attended by Hon. Maryan Qasim, Minister of MoHADM, Qin Jian, Ambassador of Republic of China, and Edith Heines, Deputy Country Director of World Food Programme, at Port of Mogadishu to welcome the arrival of more than 2,800 tonnes of rice assistance into the drought-hit country from China.

The China food support will enable MoHADM to sustain on-going efforts to save lives and avert famine in Somalia; this assistance will be used to provide hot meals to about 96,500 vulnerable people for about 3-4 months.

This Chinese food support is equivalent 10 million U.S dollars. This contribution towards emergency drought response in the country will be used to provide special therapeutic food to treat moderate malnutrition in small children and also to buy and distribute sorghum for families in need of food assistance.

“The government of Somalia was grateful for the generous contribution made by China, adding that this was not the first time for China to send assistance to the country when it was in a difficult time” said Maryan Qasim, Minister for Humanitarian Affairs and Disaster Management of Somalia.

China has also, in addition to 10 million US dollars, provided emergency relief materials, including medicine, water tanks, nutrition, and tents, to people in need in Somalia, demonstrating the sincere friendship between the two countries, said Qin Jian, Chinese Ambassador to Somalia.

MoHADM will work closely with World Food Programme (WFP) for distribution of food assistance to the people in need in Somalia.

According to statistics from the WFP, about 3.2 million people in Somalia are in need of emergency food assistance. Some 363,000 children are acutely malnourished, of whom 71,000 are severely malnourished and face a high risk of disease and death.