A World Food Program spokesman in Southern Africa said Monday that the United Nations agency has resumed the distribution of food in Zimbabwe and hopes to feed some 1 million of the country's most vulnerable people by the end of this month.
Spokesman Richard Lee said the WFP is targeting 26 districts in Matabeleland South and Matebeleland North provinces in the west, and in Manicaland, in the east of the country, whose staple maize and wheat crops disappointed this year in part due to drought, but also because of a severe, dislocating economic crisis.
WFP implementing partners such as Christian Care told VOA that they have not met with official interference so far in this round of distributing food assistance.
Lee told reporter Patience Rusere of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe that the WFP has received US$30 million from donors and is looking for US$97 million dollars more to cover the cost of food aid distribution through April of next year.