Add us as your preferred source on Google to see more of our content in Search.
Add to Preferred SourcesThe United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) in Egypt received a generous contribution of EURO15 million from the Egyptian-German Debt Swap Programme for 2020.
This new contribution builds on a previous successful partnership between WFP and the German Development Bank (KfW) on ‘Food for Education Through a Life Cycle Approach’ implemented under the previous Egyptian-German Debt Swap Programme.
WFP and its government partners will use the fund to launch a new two-year project that will support 136,000 poor families with their nutrition and education needs and provide income generation opportunities for women and youth. The ‘Investing in Human Capital in Rural Upper Egypt’ project will build the resilience of families to cope with the social and economic impacts of the COVID-19 crisis.
The project will benefit students in community schools – one-classroom schools – providing them with a daily in school nutritious snack that provides 25% of their daily nutritional needs. In addition, to encourage regular attendance in schools and combat child labour and early marriage, families of students will receive monthly cash assistance conditional on their children’s regular school attendance.
The project will also support the transformation of community schools into ‘smart schools’ equipped with technology to help foster improved learning and knowledge environment for students, educators, as well as for other community members.
It will also raise the capacity of local community stakeholders, including the Community Development Associations and NGOs to facilitate microloans for women and skills development for youth.
Additionally, the project will provide food assistance for pregnant and nursing mothers, and children under two, conditional upon regular medical checkups at health clinics. This will be complemented with improved access to public primary health, nutrition care services, and large-scale nutrition education and awareness activities reaching millions of Egyptians nationwide.
Together with the Ministry of International Cooperation, WFP is implementing the project in coordination with the Ministries of Education, Health and Population, Social Solidarity, Supply and Internal Trade, Local Development, Agriculture and Land Reclamation, the National Council of Women, as well as the National Nutrition Institute and the Egyptian Knowledge Bank.
“We have good experience working with WFP as a part of this year’s Egyptian-German Debt Swap Programme and as a partner of choice in implementing successful models of integrated development in Egypt,” said Director of the KfW Cairo Office Bernd Siegfried. “Egypt and Germany are aligned in their priorities towards sustainable development, peace, and prosperity all of which are aspects highlighted in this new project.”
WFP is the sole UN agency in Egypt providing food security to the most vulnerable populations and continues to count on the contributions of donors to sustain and upscale assistance to the most vulnerable populations in Egypt throughout its COVID-19 response and recovery phases.
Original source: WFP
Published on 27 July 2020