Beirut, Nov. 21, 2022 (Xinhua) — Lebanese interim Prime Minister Najib Mikati announced today (Monday) that the World Food Program has agreed to allocate US$5.4 billion to Lebanon over the next three years.
He did so during a joint press conference between Mikati and the director of the World Food Program in Lebanon, Abdullah Al-Wardat, at the prime minister’s headquarters in Beirut.
Mikati said that the Executive Committee of the World Food Program at its last meeting in Rome decided to allocate an amount of 5 billion 400 million US dollars to Lebanon for the next three years.
He explained that the program promised that the products to be purchased would be entirely from the Lebanese market.
He pointed out that the program had been running in Lebanon since 2012 after the Syrian displacement, and was delivering food aid to 70 percent displaced Syrians and 30 percent Lebanese, totaling $700 million annually.
He explained that after the executive meeting of the program in Rome, it was agreed to allocate 5 billion and 400 million dollars to Lebanon over the next three years, on condition that this is equally divided between the Lebanese and the Syrians.
The director of Lebanese General Security, Major General Abbas Ibrahim, said in an October 25 press conference that the official number of Syrian refugees in Lebanon is 2.8 million refugees.
In turn, Al-Wardat said the project would continue to provide emergency aid and assistance in kind and cash to the beneficiaries, with their numbers increasing to one million Syrian refugees and one million Lebanese.
He announced that the program will continue to provide assistance to students in schools benefiting from the school feeding program, and the current number is approximately 73,000 students, while the new project requires reaching approximately 150,000 students.
He stressed the continuation of providing technical and technical support to the Ministry of Social Affairs to enhance the ability to manage the project of social safety nets in cooperation with the World Bank.
He stressed that, in coordination with the Ministry of Agriculture and the International Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), food security in Lebanon will be enhanced by providing in-kind, technical and cash assistance to farmers with the goal of increasing the area of wheat cultivation in Lebanon, which imports 80% to 90% of its needs.
Lebanon has been suffering for 3 years from a serious economic and financial crisis, which the World Bank has classified as one of the 3 most serious crises the world has known since the mid-19th century. The crisis is accompanied by the collapse of the local currency against the dollar, the collapse of services and health care, as well as shortages of fuel and medicines.
