NAIROBI, Kenya
The first ship carrying grain
from Ukraine for people in the hungriest parts of the world has docked at the
Horn of Africa port of Djibouti as areas of East Africa are badly affected
by deadly
drought and conflict.Brave Commander is the first vessel specially chartered by the UN to unblock food shipments stuck after Russia’s invasion.
Food security experts call it
a drop in the bucket for the vast needs in the worst-hit Horn countries of
Somalia, Kenya and Ethiopia, the nation where this first shipment is going. But
the flow of grain from Ukraine for other hungry parts of the world is expected
to continue, with another ship departing Tuesday for Yemen. The U.N. World Food
Program has said it is working on multiple ships.
WFP says this first shipment
of grain will be shipped overland to northern Ethiopia, where millions of
people have been affected by the country’s Tigray conflict, which has now
flared up again.
How any of the grain will
reach Tigray is now in question as humanitarian deliveries by road and air have
been suspended amid the fighting that sparked again last week between Tigray
forces and Ethiopian ones. But Ethiopia’s neighboring Amhara and Afar regions
also are expected to benefit.
WFP has said the 23,000 metric
tons of grain on the first ship are enough
to feed 1.5 million people on full rations for a month. But the U.N.
has said 2.4 million in Tigray alone are severely food insecure and that 20
million people across Ethiopia face hunger.
Millions of other people in
the Horn of Africa region are going hungry because of drought, and thousands
have died. Somalia has been especially hard hit because it sourced at least 90%
of its grain from Ukraine and Russia before Russia invaded Ukraine in February.
Food security experts have
said it
will take weeks for people in African countries to see grain from
Ukraine arrive and even longer to see it bring down high food prices that have
been a source of despair and protests in multiple nations.
Far more ships carrying grain
from Ukraine have been going to richer places like Europe as existing business
contracts are fulfilled. - AP
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