Afghanistan Weekly Situation Report 4 - 10 Dec 2003

I. SITUATION UPDATE
In the north, withdrawal of heavy weapons to two cantonment sites continues. UN missions to Chimtal district in Balkh province, and Sangcharak and Kohistanat districts in Saripul province were suspended.

In the south, security incidents targeting the aid community continued, including attacks on an UNHCR field unit in Nimroz province and a NGO office in Hilmand province, and kidnapping of two Indian contractors in Zabul province. UN missions in southern, southeastern and eastern provinces remained suspended.

In the west, UN missions to Bakwa district in Farah province and on the highway between Shindand and Dilaram were suspended following the ambush on eight vehicles belonging to the Government Statistics Department that killed one and wounded four.

Movement in Khaki Jabbar district of Kabul province was temporarily restricted after the kidnapping of two Turkish nationals and one Afghan national. On 4 December, a rocket impacted near the American embassy in Kabul.

II. PROGRAMME UPDATE

During the reporting period, 689,572 beneficiaries received 2,417 MT of food, as indicated below¹:

(Note: Beneficiaries in the table do not necessarily mean new beneficiaries. They may have been included in previous reports. Food distributed per beneficiary under different activities may vary, due to variation in rations in different projects. Information here is based on reports received from implementing partners.)

WFP received US$571,429 from Luxembourg for its Protracted Relief and Recovery Operation (PRRO 10233.0). The contribution will be used to procure wheat.

Winter pre-positioning of food is 93 percent complete in areas in the north, northeast and central highlands expected to become inaccessible during the winter. Heavy snowfall in the central highlands has delayed some monitoring visits.

III. LOGISTICS UPDATE

1. IN-COUNTRY FOOD STOCK BALANCE³

2. LOGISTICS ISSUES

5,818 MT of food commodities were dispatched from external logistics hubs to extended delivery points inside Afghanistan, including:

• 578 MT of wheat and 204 MT of wheat flour from Peshawar to Kabul;
• 1,052 MT of wheat, 48 MT of wheat flour, 23 MT of pulses and 382 MT of vegetable oil from Peshawar to Jalal Abad;
• 160 MT of wheat flour from Peshawar to Mazari Sharif;
• 300 MT of vegetable oil from Peshawar to Kunduz;
• 1,097 MT of wheat, 166 MT of wheat flour, 175 MT of pulses, 675 MT of rice and 241 MT of corn-soya blend (CSB) from Quetta to Kandahar;
• 65 MT of vegetable oil from Quetta to Hirat;
• 115 MT of wheat from Termez to Mazari Sharif;
• 31 MT of wheat flour and 4 MT of salt from Kholkhozabad in Tajikistan to Khawan;
• 18 MT of salt from Kholkhozabad in Tajikistan to Darwaz; and
• 484 MT of wheat from Kholkhozabad in Tajikistan to Kunduz.

58 MT of wheat were dispatched from Quetta to Peshawar.

496 MT of vegetable oil were dispatched from Karachi Port to Peshawar and 191 MT to Quetta.

IV. OTHER SIGNIFICANT ISSUES

COLLABORATION WITH GOVERNMENT, NGOs and OTHER UN AGENCIES

In Fayz Abad, WFP trained seven staff Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development (MRRD) staff, including one woman, in issues pertaining food security and vulnerability, monitoring and evaluation, gender sensitive targeting, and preparation of project proposals and budgets. Participants expressed their interest in having further training on English and computers.

During a three-day warehouse management workshop in Kunduz and Mazari Sharif, government counterparts, including the Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of Education (MoE), Ministry of Health, Ministry of Planning, MRRD and Ministry of Women's Affairs, were trained in basic logistics practices.

On 7 December, WFP and MRRD met to improve monitoring of food assistance projects in Kunar and Laghman provinces, where insecurity restricts UN movement. WFP and MRRD agreed on MRRD's larger involvement in monitoring.

To mark the arrival of the next installment of Indian donated biscuits in Afghanistan, the Afghan actor and director Hashmat Khan participated in a ceremony on 8 December in Kabul, along with the Indian Ambassador, Vivek Katju, Afghanistan's Deputy Education Minister, Mr. Ishraq Hussaini, and the WFP Country Director, Susana Rico. Simultaneous ceremony was organised in Mazari Sharif and Hirat with MoE, Embassy of India and WFP. More than one million schoolchildren will receive a nutritious snack in school.

WFP and the Ministry of Education held a food-for-education review meeting in Kandahar. The role of the provincial department of education was redefined and it was agreed on the provision of accurate data on registered beneficiaries.

Footnotes

¹ Please note that:

- Fayz Abad refers to the WFP Fayz Abad Area Office, which includes the sub-office in Kunduz and the provinces of Badakhshan, Baghlan, Takhar and Kunduz.

- Mazari Sharif refers to the WFP Mazari Sharif Area Office, which includes the sub-office in Maymana and the provinces of Jawzjan, Balkh, Samangan, Sari Pul and Faryab.

- Kabul refers to the WFP Kabul Area Office, which includes the sub-offices in Jalal Abad and Bamyan and the provinces of Bamyan, Parwan, Wardak, Kapisa, Nuristan, Kunar, Laghman, Nangarhar, Kabul, Logar, Paktya, Khost, Paktika and Ghazni.

- Kandahar refers to the WFP Kandahar Area Office, which includes the provinces of Uruzgan, Zabul, Kandahar, Hilmand, and Nimroz.

- Hirat refers to the WFP Hirat Area Office, which includes the sub-office in Qalay-I-Naw and the provinces of Badghis, Ghor, Farah, Hirat.

² Food for education includes the following activities: school feeding, food for teachers, food for training and food for teacher training.

³ Data is based on reports from WFP area offices. It does not include food stocks in regional logistics hubs.