WFP Mali Country Brief, August 2020

In Numbers

• 2,316.227 mt of food assistance distributed

• 3,119,474 m cash-based transfers made USD 26 m six months (September 2020-February 2021) net funding requirements

• 951,352 people assisted in August 2020

Operational Updates

• The lean season and conflict related response continued over the month of August, with 916,000 vulnerable people reached, including 156,000 internally displaced persons. Furthermore, following important flooding in Mali, WFP started emergency food assistance targeting 34,000 flood-affected people in Gao,
  Koulikoro and Menaka regions. Projections from the national contingency plan indicate that 139,000 people in the country could be affected by flooding this year.

• The nutrition emergency response also continued in August in partnership with UNICEF, targeting 115,000 children aged 6-59 months and 18,385 pregnant and lactating women in Mopti, Timbuktu, Gao and Menaka region. Social behaviour change activities also continued in August promoting health and nutrition practices in targeted communities. Preparatory work for the setup of fortified blended flour has started in August and will be finalized by the end of the year.

• Since June 2020, WFP is supporting 142, 000 people to create productive assets such as land rehabilitation, feeder roads, water pond, erosion control, tree-planting, construction of agricultural infrastructure, borehole, rehabilitation of irrigation schemes for paddy rice. While these activities require gathering of people, appropriate measures were taken to prevent the spread of COVID-19 including the split of workers into small groups, the provision of face masks and handwashing kits and the respect of physical distancing on project sites. WFP also launched in August a food assistance for asset project involving the production of home-made face marks and soap to support COVID-19 prevention efforts while improving vulnerable families’ livelihoods. Participants are mainly women whose livelihoods have been disrupted by COVID-19.

• WFP Mali continues to provide logistics support to the Government including storage, transport, dispatches and inventory of health equipment and materials destined for COVID19 response.

• In order to ensure continued assistance to vulnerable population during the lean season, WFP prepositioned 6,000 mt of food in Mopti, Gao and Timbuktu. The operation had experienced two major challenges including insecurity and poor road conditions caused by the rain.