As part of its response to the conflict in the Senegalese Casamance region, the World Food Programme (WFP) has launched cash transfers to assist displaced persons in Foni Kansala, West Coast region of The Gambia.

WFP, in a statement, said 1,200 households – approximately 10,000 women, men, and children – will each receive 2,330 Gambian Dalasis per month from April to June 2022.

According to WFP, the emergency response is being delivered in coordination with the National Disaster Management Agency (NDMA) and The Gambia Red Cross Society (GRCC).

This assistance, it further said, will help conflict-affected families meet their basic food needs and replenish destroyed or lost food stocks.

It is understood that targeted families were identified through a joint assessment conducted by WFP and United Nations partners in The Gambia.

Armed conflict between the Casamance Movement of Democratic Forces (MFDC) and Senegalese forces in Senegal’s southern region have led to high cross-border displacement.

The conflict, which began in 1982, and one of the oldest in Africa, has since claimed thousands of lives.

‘Families affected by this armed conflict were already suffering from a difficult food security situation due to the poor harvest of last year, the socioeconomic fallout of Covid-19 pandemic, and the rising prices. Many of them have lost their sources of income’, WFP Country Director, Yasuhiro Tsumura, said.

‘Urgent support is needed to provide humanitarian relief and protect livelihoods for the most vulnerable families, allowing for a faster recovery from the impacts of the multifaceted crisis’.

The WFP assistance is timely in view of the already high level of food insecurity and malnutrition in the West African country.

Source: WFP

Photo source: DFID UK Department for International Development