Welcome to this press briefing of the UN Information Service here in Geneva.
Today is Friday, 15th of December.
And I would like to start by introducing you a new colleague that has joined our Geneva communication family very recently.
She's the new Chief of News in Media at the ILO.
I'll give her the floor to introduce herself.
As you know, our friend and good colleague Rosalind Yard has retired a few weeks ago, a month ago and Zaina is the new chief.
And I give up the floor for introducing yourself.
Merci beaucoup Alessandra, a anchante de fervoto connaissance.
As Alessandra just mentioned, I am new in Geneva.
I'm the new chief of News and media for the ILO.
But I'm not new to the UN family.
In fact, I'm returning to the UN family after a couple of years of teaching journalism at Northwestern University.
Previously, I served with UNICEF in Iraq and with the UN Secretariat in Somalia and East Africa.
Longtime TV journalist as well, so it's wonderful.
And I look forward to working with all of you quite closely.
Thank you very much, Zaina.
And I'm told that as soon as Zaina will have her cell phone and other contact details, ILO will inform you.
And we will also include that, of course, in our correspondence.
Thank you very much, Zaina.
Good luck with your new tenor and I'd like to continue now with UNICEF and invite Marxie and her guest only.
So we have the pleasure to have with us Ted Chiban, who is the UNICEF Deputy Executive Director for Humanitarian Action and Supply Operations.
And you're here to tell us more, Sir, about the global humanitarian appeal of UNICEF for children affected by conflict and disaster.
In my entire 25 year career in UNICEF, it is hard to recall a year in which the situation facing children affected by conflict and disaster, including due to climate, has been more dire.
For humanitarian organisation, work has rarely been more important and perhaps never more complex.
The horrendous situation in Gaza, which takes us to the core of our humanity, exemplifies this.
Earlier this week, UNICEF launched the 9.3 billion emergency funding appeal to reach at least 94,000,000 children in 155 countries.
Yet at a time where humanitarian and protection needs have never been greater, we are approaching 2024 facing an increasingly bleak funding forecast.
Flexible funding, which allows us to respond at speed, scale and nimbleness is shrinking, restricting our ability to respond quickly and ensure principled action based on needs and humanitarian actors ability to safely reach affected population where there is increasingly at risk.
And we continue to see attacks against humanitarian actors around the world throughout the year.
Children around the world have faced rampant violations and denials of their rights.
In November, I spent a week in Ukraine where I went to frontline areas in Kharkiv and Zaporiza and stressed the urgent needs for continued humanitarian response to conflict affected areas there.
In October, I went into Gaza, where we have seen an unprecedented number of children reportedly killed in the continuing violence.
In July, I met families in Sudan where millions of children have been forced from their homes in what is now the largest child displacement crisis in the world.
Beyond these headline grabbing areas affected by conflict and other crisis, there are children suffering elsewhere as well.
This year I've met children in Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Chad and Mali.
Such devastating conflicts combined with a rise in climate related disaster, disease outbreaks and displacement mean children continue to endure the unimaginable ****** and impact of protracted crises and climate related threats.
In all of these contexts, UNICEF is on the ground providing children and families with essential life saving aid and exploring innovative solutions to challenge and problems that have plagued humanity for centuries.
But at a time when humanitarian protection needs have never been greater, we are concerned that our ability to meet these needs is going to come under increasing strain.
Among the most critically underfunded emergencies right now, we have Sudan, Burkina Faso, Democratic Republic of Congo, Myanmar, Haiti, Ethiopia, Yemen, Somalia, South Sudan, and Bangladesh.
UNICEF and our partners are committed to providing a comprehensive response to the many humanitarian crises affecting children, but these children should not be paying the price of our inaction with their lives and their futures.
They need continued access to essential services like healthcare, safe water, basic sanitation, education and protection.
When I was in Sudan I met a 12 year old boy called Mahmoud and in Temporary learning centre outside of Admira he was continuing his learning on an E tablet.
But what struck me was the the image he had drawn and it was a really faithful replication of his neighbourhood down to the pharmacy across the street from his house that had been bombed out in the little parking lot where he played football.
And all he wanted was to be able to go back to that place and a sense of normalcy.
And when I was in Gaza with our executive director Kathy Russell, we made we met a 16 year old.
She was in bed and she had been hit by shrapnel in the back.
And she's never going to walk again.
These children should not be going through this.
We live in a world where we need to do everything possible, work with every fibre in our body so that children like that don't have to go through these kind of situations.
So I will open now the floor to questions in the room 1st and online.
Bruce is our correspondent of the New York Times.
Nick, you have the floor.
Could you give us some numbers, I mean just one second, Nick funding, go ahead, sorry.
Is your funding going down in absolute terms or is it rising and just as less in relation to your overall requirement?
And secondly, what does this tell you really about interest in multinational funding solutions?
It seems to me that a lot more funding is going through bilateral channels.
And do you feel that essentially you're losing, you know, the, the plot for that?
So if you look at the absolute amount of funding it's it's flat for UNICEF, what is rising is needs and actually what we've done this year is taking a really hard look at requirements and done our best to prioritise.
So the appeal this year of 9.3 billion is actually a 16% decrease over what we appealed for last year.
Not because needs have decreased, but because we've really tried to focus on how we can be most effective in responding to those needs, where it's absolutely essential that UNICEF is the best place to respond to those needs.
And how we can work in, in partnership with others to, you know, if you will be more efficient in the way we operate.
In terms of whether or not there's less funding going through the multilateral system.
The UN, including UNICEF, continues to be one of the major sources and conduit through which the world addresses crises.
We stay and deliver in countries throughout the world, including in Gaza as we speak today and Sudan as we speak today.
And I don't think there's been a a market shift certainly in humanitarian funding from the multilateral system to other sources of funding.
I think what we're seeing is increased need in a fiscally tight space affected by, you know, increasing instability because of conflict and climate, the the overhang of COVID and the economic consequences of COVID, if you will.
It's a it's a triple ****** that children around the world are facing.
Thank you very much, Liza Schlein, Voice of America.
If you don't have the money, which you apparently don't, to take care of these many children, by the way, how many children is the appeal for the $9.3 billion appeal and in how many countries?
Also, what I was wondering is what are the programmes that get cut?
Clearly, you can't provide the children with all that they need.
Also, are the funds earmarked for different countries?
And if that is the case, you mentioned countries that are the most disfavored, which are the ones that do get the most money?
So in terms of the number of children that we are working to reach this year, it's 94,000,000 children.
The 94,000,000 children are in 30 countries.
And in addition to that, we have 5 multi country appeals, so if you will, regional appeals.
So we work throughout the world, but those are the countries that are the most affected, where we concentrate the most of our work.
We don't cut programmes by area.
We continue to work in health, in nutrition, in water, sanitation, hygiene, in education and in protection.
But what we look at is where is it absolutely necessary that our interventions reach the most vulnerable children.
And that means, for example, making choices with what are the essential interventions.
Ensuring for example, that immunisation continues to be available, that primary healthcare continues to function, that children have access to treatment against severe acute malnutrition and that some of the basics around child protection, psychosocial support, mental health, addressing grave violations against children, recruitment of of children by armed groups as well as education, which is a life saving intervention in emergencies.
That all those continue to exist.
But for example, there's certain activities that that we would like to be able to sustain, say cash transfers to victims of sexual and gender based violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Facing one of the most horrible protection crises in the world, we may not be able to sustain such an operation.
So find other ways to provide support to the survivors of such horrible crimes.
Our funding for last year, we were at roughly 50%.
For this year rather, we're at roughly 50% of the total appeal and that's why I did we've, we've cut down by by 16% what we are focused on and we're prioritising.
It still makes a huge difference.
It still makes a huge difference what we do get.
And again, through this prioritisation to trying to increase efficiency, we are working on what is most essential for children.
Any other question for UNICEF, I don't see any.
So thank you very much for coming and for launching this appeal and we count on our journalists relate of course.
So let me go now to WHO we have with us Tariq and in he has brought Doctor Rosamund Lewis, who is The Who technical lead for Monkey Pox and Pox and she's going to tell us about mpox situation including current outbreak in the the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
You have the floor, Doctor Lewis.
You all recall that the global outbreak of mpox, which started in May 2022, affected more than 92,000 people in in now 117 countries.
Cambodia is the most recent country to report their first case.
We also have a reported situation on a cruise ship with an NPOX outbreak and a cruise ship in Southeast Asia and the Western Pacific, which we can come back to in in a moment.
For the Democratic Republic of the Congo, WHO has undertaken a mission there, a joint multidisciplinary mission with the Ministry of Health and all all components 3 levels of WHO regional office, country office and headquarters in that mission.
We have assessed over several weeks at the situation regarding mpox in the country and I've come up with the conclusions that that are quite concerning.
There's a rapidly expanding outbreak in the country that they this year the country has reported over 13,000 clinically compatible suspected cases of Mpox, which is more than twice the number of previously reported in any prior year and over 600 deaths among those cases.
The outbreak is expanding geographic In addition to more numbers of cases in endemic areas, the outbreak is also expanding geographically into new provinces that are not previously affected.
So that includes for example, 3 new provinces, Lualaba, Kinshasa Province and South Kibu, and really that's 23 out of the 26 province is now reporting M Fox in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
In addition to this geographic expansion and rising numbers of cases, there is also for the first time confirmation of a sexual transmission of this particular clade of the virus.
You may recall that there are two clades, Clade 1, which is Central African played in clade 2, previously known as W African clade and clade 2 is the one that went around the world.
So now in Central Africa, we are for the first time seeing sexual mission among the patients who are having played one of the monkey box virus or mpox due to played one of the virus.
This is of course very concerning because of the accelerated transmission when when transmitted through sexual networks.
In the case of the DRC, the networks most affected involve sex workers and notably female sex workers.
So the demographic picture of the outbreak in the DRC in the newly affected areas is concerning.
It's the first time we have seen mpox being reported in more women than in men, and for in South Cuba, for example, it's exclusively among adults.
Whereas in the endemic areas we still see the classic picture of mpox with large numbers of children affected.
70% of the cases in the endemic areas remain in children under 15 and mostly in children under 5.
Likewise for the deaths reported.
The case fatality ratio in the country is much higher than anywhere else in the world.
You might recall that in the global outbreak, it was under 1%, .18% to be precise, and still matches that figure today.
But in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, with the 600 deaths reported this year, we're looking at a case fatality ratio of around 5%, so much much higher.
And in the most endemic areas, or it's over 8%, almost 9%.
So we're looking at a very **** case fatality ratio for a virus.
This particular parade is already known to be more virulent than the one that went around the world.
So we can appreciate that this represents a public health risk for the people of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, for neighbouring countries, including, for example, Burundi, Rwanda, Angola, where there's a lot of population movements over the borders, including sex workers themselves are also very mobile when when they need to seek work.
And, and so there is concern of possible transmission in in other countries in the neighbouring area around Democratic Republic of Congo, including Congo Brazzaville across the river.
This also represents a risk for the rest of the world because we've already seen what can happen with mpox when it when it enters networks that have a frequent and close contact, physical contact.
And we're seeing this also in the DRC.
There are some cases among men who have sex with men in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
They are also contributing to the outbreak.
But primarily we're concerned about the major increase in cases in the endemic area as well as as well as among sex workers in previously unaffected areas.
Kinshasa, the capital, also has had an outbreak and there is concern that there may also be continuing low level transmission there because work needs to be done to raise the awareness and understanding of health workers who have not previously had to deal with or consider M boxes a sexually transmissible infection.
So there's a lot of work ongoing already in the country to to train health workers and to raise awareness of communities.
As you know, sexual transmission was already documented in Nigeria and of course in the global outbreak.
So this is the latest evolution of this of this concerning feature of this emerging orthopox virus, which was similar to smallpox in the past.
And part of the concern that we have here is, is that the virus may continue to evolve as we have seen with Clade 2.
If that were to happen with clade one, we're not really sure yet what that would look like.
So there is an urgent need in this country to invest in surveillance, laboratory testing, laboratory capacity, development of rapid tests.
Community engagement is critically important.
It's a complex situation, complex outbreak and therefore there needs to be engagement of the different communities, men who have sex with men, sex workers, people working in areas where where they go to to seek employment.
And don't realise that there may be a new risk facing them as well as those who are in the endemic areas, mostly children, very much at risk in those areas.
So WH OS continued to work with the Ministry of Health in all areas of the response, including working towards access to countermeasures.
We're talking about mpox vaccines and therapeutics.
There are trials for therapeutics ongoing around the world, but they have slowed down because thankfully the number of cases have slowed down.
The one trial that is really continuing to recruit patients faster than expected is in fact the trial in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
So we're looking forward to receiving results on the effectiveness of the therapeutic called teccoviramat from the DRC early in the new year.
And finally, vaccines, of course, have been made available to other populations around the world.
The Democratic Republic of Congo does not have access to these vaccines yet, just like many other countries don't yet have access.
And so work is being done with the regulatory authorities and with the Ministry of Health towards developing an immunisation strategy and improving importation of products into the country.
I think that's what I have for you now, really important to continue engaging with the country and with the communities affected in the country.
And I'm happy to answer any questions that you'd like.
Thank you very much, Doctor Lewis.
I open the floor to question first to the journalist here.
I don't see any, so I'll go to the platform.
Hi, Rosamund, Elaine Fletcher from Health Policy Watch.
Last year when we were dealing with this issue, the main producer of the vaccine, of the most effective vaccine, the very Nordic, had limited capacity.
It had stopped production altogether because of the renovations and its plant What's and it didn't seem to be interested in giving out a licence to anybody else.
What's happening with that vaccine chokehold today?
Thank you for the question.
So the manufacturer is very interested in engaging with WHO to continue to make vaccines more available.
So production capacity is being increased.
They found a way to to increase production capacity fivefold.
And so they are working on that.
And we'll we'll also secure licencing for that new process.
So that is a development that we're actively looking forward to obviously as well as increasing access, as I mentioned, through regulatory procedures as well as many countries around the world that did procure the vaccine are in fact now also ready to offer vaccine to low middle income countries.
We're also working with Gabby on their assessment of the situation.
Lisa Shrine versus America.
You said that monkey pox doesn't stay where it is in the country, that it represents a risk to the rest of the world.
Would you elaborate upon this?
Is this a situation where ultimately if it is allowed to spread from 1 country to another that it could pose an international public health risk as other diseases have been designated, most recently COVID?
You may recall that there was in fact a public health emergency of international concern declared also for M Box last year in 2022, from June or July of that year through to May of 2023, that was the status as the capacity to respond to that outbreak improved and the number of cases declined that that capacity was lifted.
However, for WHO, the mpox global outbreak is still considered an ongoing emergency.
And this new situation with this new more, well, not new clade, but this more virulent clade, this new situation, the Democratic Republic of the Congo is therefore very concerning in that regard.
We have already seen what mpox can do.
And so I can't, I don't have a crystal ball, but but yes, we are concerned that this, that this outbreak in the DRC may eventually behave the same way.
We don't know exactly what transpired in the five years prior to the global outbreak of Plate 2, but we do know that there was ongoing transmission, newly emerging ongoing transmission in Nigeria since 2017 up to 2021.
And so the outbreak in 2022, while it came as a surprise, the format in which it came, the way in which it transmitted it was, it was not at the end.
It was surprising that it emerged globally.
And so we are concerned that there may be further international transmission of this clade, one also from the from the country where it is most commonly reported.
Thank you very much, Doctor Lewis.
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Mr Otti, you have the floor.
I'm sorry if you may be answered in French already, but I'm I'm going to ask anyway because you mentioned the cruise ship.
Could you explain what can you tell us more?
How, what is the mode of transmission on that cruise?
How many people have been infected?
Yes, we have information, but it's not complete information that there was an outbreak of M Pox on a cruise liner which visited 5 countries in the month of November.
A patient returned home to a country in Europe and tested positive by PCR for M Pox, for which symptoms had developed on the ship.
That same person also reported being aware of quite a number of other patients on the ship.
However, we don't have a report an official report, neither from the cruise line or nor from the countries in which that that ship stopped at port, and so we don't have a lot of information about what transpired on the ship itself.
However, this serves as a warning that events and gatherings still represent risk.
That was a themed cruise, primarily men have sex with men on that ship as well as crew.
And and so this represents a risk that gatherings, events can still lead to outbreaks and and amplifying events.
As people from many countries, we're on that ship.
We don't have the nationalities of the folks that were on that ship, but the report was that there were people from all over the world.
So vigilance must be maintained both for Clade 2 as well as Clade 1 because the virus, both viruses are now circulating.
So far played one is is that remains in Central Africa.
We hope it will, we can keep it that way.
But played two is definitely still causing outbreaks in specific circumstances and in newly reporting countries.
However, many countries have stopped reporting.
You might recall that the Director General issued standing recommendations in August of 2023 asking all Member states to continue surveillance and reporting of impacts cases.
However, many countries around the world do not report or have ceased reporting.
So our visibility on the outbreak is less than it was a year ago, but we still have these red flags and outbreaks reported that serve as a reminder that we all need to remain vigilant.
Questions, other questions to W2, I don't see any.
So I would like to thank you very much, Doctor Lewis for being with us for this update.
And I go now to our colleagues of FAO and World Food Programme.
We have with us Adam Yao, Deputy FAO Representative for Sudan and he is calling Gazin from Centre State in Sudan and also Lanny Kinsley, who is the WFP spokesperson for Sudan.
And I think you are in Nairobi and you are going to brief us on the food security situation in Sudan.
I think maybe we'll start with Mr Yao.
Thank you very much and good morning, everybody.
Now we can hear and we can see you.
To do Mark 8 months since the escalating violence that broke out in Sudan.
The food security situation in the country is dire and has a search to extremely alarming level, requiring our immediate and collective action.
According to the newly released Integrated Food Security Phase classification projection, 17.57 million people across the Sudan, accounting for 37% of the analysed population, are facing **** level of acute food insecurity classified in IPC phase three or above between October 2023 and February 2024.
Compared to the previous second projection analysis in in June 2023, around 1.7 million people have shifted from IPC phase one to IPC phase two.
At the same time, the estimated population facing **** level of acute food insecurity, IPC phase three and above increased from 15,000,000 people to 17.7 million people.
The most acutely food insecure population are located in states affected by **** level of violence including Greater Bafu, Greater Kodofan, Khartoum and especially in the three city area of Khartoum, Bahri and Durman.
3.9 people, over half of the population face **** level of acute food insecurity on the IPC scale.
3 and above in Greater Darfur.
About 5.3 million people, almost half of the total population in Darfur region, are likely to be on IPC scale.
Or at both in Britain, Cordofan about two point 7,000,044% of the total population in Cordofan state are in IPC phase three and above.
Let's figure out the hardest ever recorded that coincide with Sudan having harvesting season.
The food crisis is exacerbated by ongoing conflict, escalating violence, low agricultural production, **** food prices, the club is shock and displacement.
Factors such as the stable range for condition, the widespread of plant pest, the unavailability and accessibility of agricultural input, and the surge in the prices are collectively contributing to the decline of the seasonal agricultural performance, according to FOWLS recently released rapid assessment in November 2023.
The assessment also indicated that the production of key staple cereal, sorghum and Millet is projected to decline by 24% and 50% respectively compared to the previous season.
While Sudan possess sufficient land and water resources, the ongoing conflict impede farmer access physically due to security ******, but because of the lack of financial resources to access agricultural input to resume with the farming activity to produce enough food, the the Sudanese people require more support.
More than ever, our immediate action to preserve the life and livelihood of rural Sudanese community is absolutely crucial.
The more life we expose to the imminent ****** of famine, funding is of the essence, and swift action is our only shield against this looming danger.
Fasten the result in its support for Sudanese rural community between July and September 2023, ahead of the critical planting season, far reach over 1,000,000 farming household or 5 million people to support local food production and sustain a rural livelihood.
However, instability and access challenges continue to threaten food security.
As we speak, I'm currently in Kosi and I was planning to travel to a scenario again in Wadma Dani.
But we were told that there is some fighting in Wadma Dani then preventing us for for travelling at the moment.
So and security is still ongoing and we are monitoring the situation and we will continue to update the all the stakeholder on the food security situation in the Sudan.
Thank you very much for your attention.
Thank you very much, Lenny.
Thank you so much for having me.
So as my colleague Adam mentioned, today we mark a grim milestone, 8 months since a horrific war erupted across Sudan, which is showing no sign of abating and continues to spread, as we have just heard from Adam, into Jazeera State, which is Sudan's bread basket.
That's eight months of terror, violence, displacement and immeasurable suffering that the Sudanese people have had to endure in what is becoming one of the world's worst humanitarian crises.
The suffering is unimaginable, yet the crisis has not been getting the international focus and attention that is warranted.
As WFP, we are warning of a looming hunger catastrophe by next year's lean season if we are unable to expand access and regularly deliver food assistance to people trapped in conflict hotspots such as Khartoum, the Darfur region in the West and the South Central Kordofan region.
I was speaking to one of my colleagues the other day whose family can't escape the capital, Khartoum.
Unable to get past checkpoints to flee the violence amid ongoing airstrikes and shelling, they are risking their lives just to go outside to purchase basic goods.
Even now, they are struggling to put food on their plates.
Yet when the lean season hits in May and food becomes less available, they may be out of options unless WFP can get through and regularly deliver assistance.
As my colleague Adam mentioned, the hunger crisis is deepening at an alarming rate as the new IPC food security analysis shows the highest levels of hunger ever recorded during the current harvest season.
And this is a season where typically there is more food available.
If there's no significant increase in food assistance by the time the lean season arrives in about 6 months, conflict hotspots could see the emergence of catastrophic hunger or level 5 out of five, the highest on the IPC scale.
Again, as my colleague mentioned, nearly 18 million people across Sudan are facing acute hunger right now.
Now that is equivalent to the entire population of the Netherlands.
The entire population of the Netherlands.
And more than double the number at the same time a year ago.
This figure is also higher than the initial projection, which was made for this time period of around 15,000,000, which again just demonstrates how rapidly the food security situation is worsening.
Close to 5 million people are in emergency levels of food insecurity, or level 4 out of five.
What is most concerning about that is that over 3/4 of these people in that **** level of emergency levels of hunger are cornered in areas where humanitarian access has been intermittent and in some areas impossible due to ongoing fighting.
Since the start of the conflict, WFP has provided life saving assistance to over 5 million people, preventing an even worse deterioration of food security, especially in eastern and northern Sudan.
Yet this is only scratching the surface compared to the immense needs that we are seeing on ground.
My colleagues in Jazeera state, where many people from Khartoum fled to, say they see crowds of people lining up, but there's not enough assistance on hand to support everyone, only those in the highest levels of hunger, meaning that others could also slip into deeper levels of hunger come May.
Regular and safe humanitarian access to civilians in areas worst hit by violence has, quite frankly, been inadequate.
WFP has been able to take advantage of momentary lulls in fighting to reach families in greater Khartoum, but has only managed to reach the Capital One time in the last three months.
Only one in five people who WFP has identified as most urgently in need of food assistance in the Khartoum area has received food aid since the conflict started.
Only one in five of the people who need it in Sudan's capital have received support because of access issues.
Regular convoys of food assistance have travelled from Chad to West and Central Darfur since August, where we have opened up a humanitarian Ford or a cross-border humanitarian Ford or there we've been able to provide a million people A5, sorry, half a million people with food assistance.
However, people in other parts of the Darfur region, like South Darfur, have not received any assistance at all since June, despite WFP's repeated attempts to obtain safe access.
The picture I'm painting here today is extremely dire and as WFP we are alarmed of what will happen to the millions of people who are looking to US and other aid organisations in their greatest hour of need.
That is why WFP is urgently calling on all parties to the conflict for a humanitarian ceasefire and unfettered humanitarian access to avert a hunger catastrophe in the upcoming lease lean season.
Lives are depending on it.
Indeed, thank you very much.
Let me ask the journalist if they have any question on this matter.
This is for AP or Al Jazeera.
For Al Jazeera, OK, our correspondent for Al Jazeera.
Yesterday I called some families from Khartoum and they said there is a lot of, there's a lack of, of foods, a lack of, there is a lack of food and they, they, they, they don't have enough food and they don't have enough water.
Are you able to reach these people in especially in Khartoum?
Don't know who would like to take this, maybe WFP?
For Adam, OK, for Adam maybe, OK, maybe then the brief be Lenny can add something.
So let's start with Adam.
I mean thank you for this question.
I think the we have to put it that way, the crisis is deepening, that's true.
But at the same time, the support that, for example, file provided, we reached over 1,000,000 farmers who were able to produce between 2 and 3,000,000 tonne of cereal.
Those food are local food that are available in the country that are even contribute to reduce the the food prices.
If if if you you do the the analysis correctly.
Now, the problem that we mentioned here is that some of the how to reach area like Cartoon, the DARFU and the Cordova where we cannot even reach as my colleague from WFP said, there is no way you can reach people even if the food is there.
The logistic is not, they're not there is no management access you cannot reach.
So that is really where we are appealing for a ceasefire to allow a managerial corridor to be open so that those organisation who are distributing food item can have access.
As for As for FAO, our appeal is to continue to support the farming community to produce enough food in area that are accessible in the great area of production like Sinar, Kassala, Kosti, White Nile and, and and and other area where we still have access to ensure that the local food is available.
And, and also where food is not available or where we cannot access, sorry.
We could also then imagine doing some cash transfer in a way that people can buy locally if there are there are food in those in those market.
But the issue really which is critical.
We really need a Manchurian access.
We need the Manchurian corridor in a way that convoy can move and and access those people in the hard to reach area.
That is really critical, as my colleagues, Lenny also said.
Lenny me but you want to add something?
Thank you so much for your question.
And as as you said, there's you're hearing reports of lack of food in Khartoum.
So first of all, that's what is extremely concerning is because right now is the harvest season, there are more crops available, there's more food availability and we're looking at six months down the line when crops become less available, when stocks run out, we could be looking at at a complete lack of food in Khartoum.
Now in terms of accessing Khartoum, this has been one of the greatest challenges for WFP.
So just at the end of November, we managed to breakthrough and reach into Karate area of Khartoum where we did distributions for 100,000 people.
But as I said, that was the first time we were able to reach Khartoum actually since July.
And it's been, we also tried to breakthrough and push access through to Devil Aulia.
We're fighting has been ongoing and and was it was too intense to actually deliver the aid safely.
So we weren't able to reach Devil Aulia for example.
But we're doing everything possible to try to deliver aid when and where feasible.
And This is why we are also calling on all parties for a ceasefire so that these people who are trapped in conflict hotspots, especially in the greater Khartoum area, can get the help they need.
Any other question I see Lisa Schlein.
Lisa, I saw your message on the chat that you really need the the notes of our colleagues immediately key is on this Cool.
And I hope that yeah, she said just sent before the briefing, so you should have it already.
But go ahead, Lisa, if you have a question.
You're calling for a humanitarian corridor.
I may have my my facts wrong.
I'm getting confused by all of these crises that are doubling us, but I believe that recently WFP was caught in some kind of a some some of your aid workers were wounded.
I'm not sure whether this happened in Sudan while delivering aid, even though they had been promised guarantees of safety.
Essentially, my question is you seem to have difficulty in getting agreement by the warring parties for the delivery, safe delivery of aid.
Can you even trust their words that if they do allow you to deliver aid, that in fact your aid workers will be safe?
This must be really kind of very concerning to you.
We, however, want to start.
And as WFP, this is one of our greatest concerns is the safety and security of our staff.
And as we have seen in the past, there have been humanitarian ceasefires announced that were broken sometimes within minutes, sometimes within hours.
And so we haven't seen any reliable actual ceasefire in the active fighting zones and that is is concerning for us.
However, we will continue to push and and call on all parties for that humanitarian access and for that ceasefire.
But we know that we're operating in one of the the most complex environments in the world.
But that is what we do as WFP is work in these very tough environments and and get aid where get aid through to where it's feasible while ensuring the safety and security of our staff and our convoys and the food assistance.
I don't know if Adam wants to add anything.
Any other question to our colleagues?
Yes, no, I just wanted to add that, yes, the situation is complex as my colleagues and ladies say.
But we also have to recognise the the tremendous work that Ucha did for the the conflicting to allow the humanitarian actor to access to those have to reach.
Some of those have to reach area.
Because we, for example, were able to access with our our seed distribution 16 state in, in, in in the Sudan.
But after mainly due to the the conflicting in the Juba, the Jada platform that was put in place to to negotiate to allow those actors to to stop fighting and allow us to reach will really will will again appeal to to all actors to to to provide support in a way that humanitarian access is provided.
And so that we we can do our our our work and and which those people who are trapped in the Haperwich areas.
Thank you very much, Nikamim Bruce.
I just wondered, I mean, given the scale the, the, the, the huge size of the of the numbers of people that are in need of food assistance, how much food do you need and do is there, are there food stocks, where would this come from?
Is there sufficient sourcing supplies of of food available to you to to address these needs?
Thanks so much for your question.
So at the moment, we have just over 30,000 metric tonnes of food stocks in Port Sudan, which is enough for the food assistance that we have planned for this month.
And I just want to go into a little bit how difficult the access is on that question.
So we have our food stocks in Port Sudan, which is 88150 kilometres away from Cartoon.
So we're sending convoys through Eastern Sudan trying to get into Khartoum.
And that's, this is one of the things that makes it difficult to reach people in these hard places is that we're coming in from an area that's controlled by the army going into different lines of control.
And that's what makes it extremely difficult.
Then on the sorry, back to the stocks issue, for example, for next month, we actually only so far have 50% of the stocks in the country for what we have planned for next month.
So that's also one of the issues is funding.
So we're calling on, on our partners and donors to step up.
dollars over the next six months to provide assistance to around 6 to 7 million people who we have planned for those next six months that are in the highest levels of food insecurity.
So right now, at the moment for the next let's say 2-3 weeks, we have enough stocks and country.
But starting in the next year, those stocks may not be enough unless we are able to get additional shipments and if we get additional funding.
Nick, you have a follow up?
I mean, is, is that sufficient grain available in world markets for you to find what you need?
So sourcing, sourcing, sourcing at the moment has not really been an operational issue for us.
Think that's pretty much answered the question.
Yeah, Yeah, it's pretty clear, Lisa.
As a follow up, you, you mentioned that you are maybe your FAO colleague mentioned that no food was getting into Darfur.
Does that mean that no food has been able to be delivered from Chad into Darfur, which has been the case previously?
And then also, are many, because they're so hungry and they're in danger, Are many people still fleeing Sudan?
Are they even able to flee Sudan because of the two neighbouring countries, because of the instability and.
Let's start with Lenny and then go to Adam.
Thanks so much, Lisa, for your question.
So we actually have been able to get food assistance into the Darfur region.
At the beginning of the conflict, we actually had food stocks still available in the Darfur region.
But then most recently, actually in the last four or five months, we had a breakthrough where we were able to open up a humanitarian corridor from Chad, Abisha for China that's going into West Star 4.
So we've had 10 different convoys of food assistance going through.
So since that humanitarian corridor opened up, we've been able to support around half a million people.
And then putting together that with the pre-existing stocks that we already had and distributed when the conflict started, we've reached over 1,000,000 people in the Darfur region.
But it still isn't enough because we're not able to reach certain parts of the Darfur.
So there are five different states in the Darfur right now.
We've only been able to reach West and east.
We haven't been able to provide any support in South Darfur, for example, since June.
So this is the challenge that we're trying to expand and build on this humanitarian corridor in a very complex operating environment where you're not just looking up the 2 main parties to the conflict, but also different armed groups that are control of different areas and different parts of the Darfur.
So it's a lot of nuanced negotiations that go on and, and, and a wide array of actors that need to be communicated to and make sure that that line of communication is clear, that the command and control in different areas is clear for us to be able to move those trucks to different areas.
No, just regarding the Darfu, the, the issue I was mentioning that from June to August, during the, the, the, the agricultural campaign, the planting time, the, IT was difficult to provide agricultural input to the, to the farmers in the Darfu and the cordo farm so that they can produce enough local cereal and, and, and support the food and nutrition security.
That was, I was, I was referring to.
So, but well, now the establishment of the, the cross-border operation, I'm pretty sure that some food item are coming from, from, from cross-border and people can certainly have more access.
But we need really to bear in mind that one of the, the, the key strategy should be to allow, because Sudan has sufficient lands and water to provide assistance in a way that people can produce enough local cereal and be able to, to, to strengthen their, their food and security and resilience.
And this is what FAU is doing and will really be appealing for a donor to to support those initiatives.
Lisa, you have another follow.
Yeah, you didn't answer my question as to whether people were were fleeing from Sudan, whether they were even able to flee.
And also the Mr Yeo, how much money does FAO need?
WFP told us that I don't believe you did.
Actually I had written down to follow up on your on the second part of your question.
So thanks for reminding me.
So people are still fleeing Sudan right now.
There's around 6.7 million people who have been displaced since the conflict started.
That's both internally and to neighbouring countries.
Of those, 1.4 million people have crossed borders.
There's around half a million refugees, Sudanese refugees on the Chad border who also are not receiving the support that they need because our Chad operation is also facing extreme funding shortfalls, around 185,000,000 U.S.
dollars and may be forced to cut rations for refugees across the entire country, which would also affect the Sudanese refugees that are on that border.
So to your question, yes, people are still fleeing and people still are on the move.
And like my colleague Adam mentioned earlier, the conflict continues to spread to different areas.
So people have maybe fled once, might be forced to flee again, whether inside or outside the borders.
But it's a very, very, I mean, it's an, it's an act of war zone and people are trying to find whatever way they can to survive.
Yes, I mean urgently if I would require will need 75 million U.S.
dollars to support local food production and then we have to get ready because the planting season is coming from May to August.
Now if the resources are available, we'll be able to put people, the farmers to produce enough local cereal, which will also then contribute to birth synergy with our colleagues from WFP while they're distributing food.
We are supporting those a household to produce their own food in a way that they they can better, they can be building their resiliency and be better off even during the lean season.
John Zaracostas, Francois and Catherine.
The Lancet from the room.
My question is to the Well Food Programme representative.
I was wondering if you could give us an overview.
You mentioned the shortfalls both in the Sudan and the neighbouring Chad in the recent Global Appeal.
How much is the World Food Programme?
Asking from donors globally and where are your biggest shortfalls besides Sudan and Chad?
Just to put a perspective on the needs and the shortfalls, how much have you received so far this year and what are you asking for for next year?
So I would need to get back to you on the exact global figure because I'm specifically focused on Sudan, the spokesperson for WFP Sudan.
So we'll get back to you with that exact global figure, but for the regional response from the Sudan crisis, it's around 650 million U.S.
dollars because this conflict is spilling over into not the conflict is spilling over, but it's impacting the countries around Sudan.
So Chad, South Sudan, Egypt, Ethiopia.
And for that entire regional response, it's around 650 million U.S.
But we'll get back to you with an exact figure on the on the global needs.
I think that was the last question for our colleagues of FAU and WFPI have look at the chat and apparently our the note have been sent and I see that James Belgrave is asking John to if you can send your e-mail, if you can put your e-mail so that they can send it to you.
We'll put you in contact Solange can can help on this.
So thank you very much to our colleagues for this extensive briefing.
I've got a few of an announcements for you this afternoon.
We expect sorry to have a stick out by **** Commissioner Grandy.
I'm very sorry by **** Commissioner Grandy at the PAL Expo.
I still don't have exactly the confirmation of the and and the timing, but we will let you know as soon as possible.
That would be at PAL Expo in person as last time, but you would be able to follow it on on web TV.
We have a press conference that I think has been announced for Tuesday, 19 December at 9:30, so just before the briefing, and that's on Ukraine's second winter under war.
And the theme is also health system challenges and the way forward.
That's with Doctor Yarno Havich, the The Bridge representative in Ukraine.
We referred several times here at the briefing.
I also wanted to remind you that there are arrangements in place for next week just for your just to recall that starting the Wednesday 20th included, the presentation will be closed and this will be the case until the 8th of January when we will reopen.
So basically the 5th, Friday the 5th if we look at working days.
And on the Monday 8th of of January, the pallet will reopen.
As we have told you already, the pallet will be closed, but the journalist will be able to access building S2 which will function normally, which means also heating.
But the rest of the pallet will be closed except for one building which will be reserved to stuff that really needs to come in.
So don't expect services, that's what it means.
But of course, if there are and we hope not important events happening in this.
We will of course reopen our facility including the press room, etcetera.
The last briefing will be on the 22nd of December.
As usual, we will make a pause during the season, holidays and the 22nd of December's briefing because the Palace crews will be virtual, as will be the briefing, the first briefing of the New year on the 5th of January.
If you have any question on these matters, please don't hesitate to ask.
Yeah, I think that this is what I wanted to say.
And I see there is a question from Isabel.
Just on the a statement by Mr Grandy, are we sure that we could follow it by webcast?
Because yesterday, in with talking with our colleagues of UNHCR, it was not clear at all if it was technically possible.
To the best of my religion, I think I'm pretty correct here.
The the the problem is that you don't have a virtual or hybrid press conference from Paddockspore for technical reasons.
That means it's not like here you have a zoom link to which you can connect and ask question to the **** Commissioner.
But the stick out, I think it will be not a full-fledged press conference, but a quite a more rapid stick out will be covered live by our colleagues at Paddocks For and will be put on UN Web TV, the usual address UN Web TV where we put all our press conference.
So we won't be able to ask questions, but you will be able to listen to what the **** Commissioner has to say.
And this was the case also for Mr Grandy's first press conference on the 13th.
And it was the case with Mr Ladzarini yesterday for his conference on the situation in Gaza.
It was available and he's still, by the way, available on on Web TV.
I'm a technical ***** but I am unable to open the FAO notes which is a shame because I really need them.
It's sent as a download and it keeps asking me or whoever to go to an App Store and I can't do it and it's horrible and.
Send it as a real word processing, you know.
Don't worry, Lisa, don't worry.
I see the answer key, he says.
We'll send you again and I guess it will be in a clearer way.
Yeah, in in in a normal way.
It's normal these days as you say.
No, no, but service tutela party restoration sera for me no operation SEPA you are probably more fashion sepasia machine distribute trees the the the produi the Lezon key to that mission.
No Copa the machine distribution and service avec the person Merci buku.
In any case, we we still have in in person next briefing on Tuesday.
I wish you a very good weekend and as I said, we'll give you more information on the stick out of **** Commissioner Grandy of this afternoon.
