CERF Allocates $2 Million for Underfunded Emergency Situation in Nepal
6 October 2010: CERF allocates $2 million to Nepal in response to ongoing humanitarian emergencies regarding food security, nutrition, healthcare, and conflict-induced internally displaced peoples (IDPs).
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) will receive $769,000 to improve water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) facilities and to supplement nutrition programmes. The World Food Programme (WFP) has been allocated $521,000 to assist vulnerable populations affected by conflict, natural disasters and high food prices. The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) will use $236,000 for emergency mobile reproductive health services for remote and conflict-affected districts in Nepal. The World Health Organization (WHO) has been allocated $221,000 to enhance basic emergency health care services in remote regions of Nepal. United Nations Habitat will receive $147,000 for WASH programmes. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) will use $106,000 for protection and assistance to refugees from Bhutan living in camps in Nepal.
Three and a half million people in Nepal are considered moderately to severely food insecure, a problem exacerbated by erratic changes in weather patterns and sustained high food prices, with year-on-year food price inflation remaining at 18 per cent. Also, approximately 12 million people (41 per cent of the total population) are undernourished. Furthermore, the stunting rate in Nepal is one of the highest in the world, with 49 per cent of children under-5 affected.
Further humanitarian concerns lie in the Nepalese healthcare system, which is characterized by high maternal mortality and uterine prolapse rates, a resurgence of polio outbreaks, and an extremely low rate of physicians per population (at 21 per 100,000).
Moreover, a residual caseload of 50,000 – 70,000 conflict-induced IDPs remain in Nepal, along with 77,616 refugees from Bhutan, with approximately 1,000 Tibetan refugees travelling through Nepal to a third country every year.
[Last updated: 1 November 2010]