UNITED NATIONS
The United Nations and its global humanitarian partners appealed Monday for US$2 billion for Africa’s Sahel region, warning that out of the US$1.7 billion requested in 2013 donors have only funded 63 percent.
The U.N. said more donors are needed as soon as possible to meet the basic needs of the people.
Sahel, which spreads from Mauritania on Africa's west coast to Eritrea in the east, has undergone three major droughts since 2005.
According to the U.N., more than 20 million people are presently at risk of hunger in the region, and an estimated five million children under the age of five are at risk of acute malnutrition.
The U.N. has also said that population growth in the Sahel is outstripping food production.
In the long run, Sahel can expect huge funds - Last November U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim pledged US$1.5 billion in new regional investments over two years, while the European Union has announced it will provide US$6.75 billion to six countries that the Sahel passes through over the next seven years.
The European Commission alone has said it will give 142 million euros (almost $US200 million) in humanitarian aid in 2014.
In September 2013, the U.N. General Assembly agreed that “collective efforts” must address urgent humanitarian needs and “long-term development and security threats” in the region.
The U.N. has developed a three-year strategy for Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chad, Gambia, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria and Senegal.
According to the written statement, the U.N. strategy aims “to bolster governance, security, humanitarian requirements and development, while enhancing coordination in four spheres between the governments of the region, between members of the international community, reaching out and listening to the people of the Sahel.”
The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs also warned Monday that fighting has forced some 1.2 million people to flee the Sahel, including areas of Mali, Nigeria, Sudan and the Central African Republic.
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