For Immediate Release
Press Release
USAID is Dedicated to Helping Burundi Achieve Food Security
This year, World Food Day finds us at the tail end of a global pandemic, temperatures that are impacting human habitation globally, a raging war in Ukraine, rising prices and growing international tensions. Each one of these events has pushed even more people into poverty and continues to threaten the hard-won results of our development efforts around the world. No country has been spared from these negative effects; however, these problems affect Burundi more profoundly than many other nations.
In Burundi, USAID works to ensure that the most vulnerable groups have access to nutritious food. Thanks to a generous financial contribution of approximately USD 15 million, USAID, through the World Food Program, is providing food products and cash-for-food assistance to 55,000 refugee returnees from neighboring countries, internally displaced persons, and nearly 7,000 people affected by recent floods in Gatumba/Bujumbura and Rumonge province.
In addition, Burundian returnees receive a three-month food package on arrival, that helps them bridge the food gap while they get resettled. This funding also covers an additional supplementary feeding program for malnourished children and pregnant and lactating women and girls.
The theme of World Food Day 2022 “Leave NO ONE behind” emphasizes the pressing need for inclusion throughout our efforts aimed at food security. The most vulnerable groups, such as refugees, returnees, asylum seekers and internally displaced people, must be intentionally and routinely included in the efforts aimed at food security.
World Food Day reminds us all that access to food is a human right, and that we must work together to achieve food security at a global scale. USAID remains a reliable partner, dedicated to achieving this goal.
For more information on the work of USAID in Burundi, please visit www.usaid.gov/burundi , or contact BujumburaPAO@state.gov .