Provision of immediate food relief for 250,000 earthquake-affected Haitians by ACTED
Port‐au‐Prince, February 3rd 2010 – ACTED was among the first humanitarian actors to begin significant relief operations in the aftermath of the January 12th Haiti earthquake. For the past two weeks, ACTED teams have been delivering food relief for IDPs in Port‐au‐Prince and in Leogane. 58,000 dry‐food rations have already been provided and another 222,000 are due to be distributed in the upcoming days. ACTED will thus cover the regular food needs of at least 300,000 people in this first phase.
As such, ACTED is one of the leading relief agencies on food distributions in Haiti and was chosen to run part of the voucher‐food programme specifically set up by the WFP in the capital city. This initiative aims at delivering food aid to two million people in two weeks, with a systematic and coordinated approach. “This new food‐distribution strategy was developed by WFP and its partners, among which ACTED, in order to increase the speed of food distributions in the Haitian capital”, explains the ACTED emergency coordinator in Haiti Luca Pupulin.
Since Sunday, ACTED has started food distributions in this framework in two distribution points out of the 16 set up in Port‐au‐Prince. Every site can deliver food aid to 1,700 women daily. Indeed, one of the particularities of this process is that only women are entitled to receive food aid; that is a 25 kilogram bag of rice per woman that will cover the needs of one family. This choice was made “in line with lessons‐learnt from other crisis food where food rations are handed-over to women, who use it in their household and share it with other people, rather than trade it”, explains Luca Pupulin.
With local community leaders and the authorities, our teams distribute daily 3,400 food‐vouchers to the women of Port‐au‐Prince who redeem them the next day against a bag of rice in the distribution points. For ACTED’s emergency coordinator in Haiti, “this new strategy will not only directly help households that receive the rice, but will also indirectly affect the entire population by reducing the price of rice in the capital‐city.”
In the meantime, our teams pursue targeted food distributions for vulnerable orphanages of Port‐au‐Prince. 6 institutions have already benefited from these food deliveries and another 40 are to receive similar support in the days to come.
Today, over a 100 ACTED staff is mobilized in Haiti to manage and coordinate these food relief operations, but also to ensure the distribution of potable water, to provide the earthquake‐affected populations with shelters and sanitation in the IDP camps of Port‐au‐Prince but also in Carrefour‐Feuille, Leogane, Jacmel, Flon, Petit‐Goâve, Grand‐Goâve and Hinche.
ACTED has started food distributions in this framework in two distribution points out of the 16 set up in Port‐au‐Prince.
Every site can deliver food aid to 1,700 women daily. Indeed, one of the particularities of this process is that only women are entitled to receive food aid; that is a 25 kilogram bag of rice per woman that will cover the needs of one family.
Our teams distribute daily 3,400 food‐vouchers to the women of Port‐au‐Prince who redeem them the next day against a bag of rice in the distribution points.
In the meantime, our teams pursue targeted food distributions for vulnerable orphanages of Port‐au‐Prince. 6 institutions have already benefited from these food deliveries and another 40 are to receive similar support in the days to come.
