Tuesday, October 01, 2002
4 million N Koreans face food crisis: UN
Agencies
Beijing, September 30: More than four million North Korean women, children and elderly people risk losing vital food donations as winter approaches if the outside world does not immediately pledge new aid, the United Nations warned today.
The looming crisis could cause permanent physical and mental damage to vulnerable unborn babies and children, warned Richard W. Corsino, country director of the UN World Food Programme.
A slump in donations, worsened by a drop in Japanese aid, means that pregnant and breastfeeding women and children under the age of two may soon see a complete halt in grain rations, he said.
''If we're not able to provide food to these groups, then you'll see permanent damage,'' Corsino said.
Even if more food were to be pledged today, massive ration stoppages are already inevitable and will be felt by three million recipients over the next two months. In September, almost one million underfed primary school children were deprived of a daily 200-gram grain ration, while 140,000 elderly people have lost a 500-gram ration.
In October, cereal distributions to nearly half a million on kindergarten children and 250,000 pregnant and nursing women will end, and in November almost one million nursery children will see a stop in rations.
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