Nepal, with a population of 28 million people, is a food deficit country struggling to rebuild its government after an 11-year civil war. One of the poorest countries in South Asia, it ranks 144 out of 182 countries in the 2009 Human Development Index.  Poverty, high food prices, the global financial crisis, lack of agricultural investment, frequent and severe natural disasters, and ongoing political instability have taken their toll – accelerating rates of hunger and pushing more people over the edge. Malnutrition rates are alarming. Every other child under 5 is chronically malnourished and anemic. Acute malnutrition rates exceed the emergency threshold of 15 percent in many communities. Because of malnutrition, millions of children face irreversible mental and physical damage that will ultimately rob them of their full earning potential when they become adults – perpetuating the cycle of poverty and undermining development efforts in Nepal.

In 2010, WFP’s operational budget is more than US$98 million. WFP plans to provide food and cash assistance to more than two million vulnerable people living in 34 of Nepal’s 75 districts. Our operations in Nepal include:

This operation addresses immediate food needs of Nepal’s poor while enabling communities to create economic opportunities and productive assets to reduce chronic hunger and poverty.  More than 1.6 million people in 2010 are targeted to receive food and/or cash assistance in exchange for work to create vital assets like roads, trails, and irrigations systems that will contribute to longer-term food security. More than 110,000 children (6 -59 months) of food/cash-for-asset participants will receive a daily supplement of micronutrient powder, called Vita-Mishran, in order to address high rates of micronutrient deficiencies and malnutrition.  This is WFP’s largest operation in Nepal with the majority of beneficiaries living in the Mid- and Far-West.

For 18 years, WFP has been providing humanitarian food assistance to tens of thousands of refugees from Bhutan living in seven camps in eastern Nepal. Despite third country resettlement which became an option in late 2007, food assistance will be needed to support camp residents for years to come. In 2010, WFP will provide daily food rations to more than 80,000 refugees.

WFP’s Country Programme benefits more than 520,000 of Nepal’s most food insecure people – primarily children and women. Activities include:
·    School Feeding/Girls Incentive Programme: serves as a magnet for increasing enrolment, attendance and improves the nutritional status of children by providing a fortified mid-day meal. Girls receive monthly-take home rations of cooking oil as an incentive for regularly going to school.  
·    Maternal and Child Health Care: improves nutritional status of pregnant and lactating mothers and their young children with monthly take-home rations of fortified food. This critically timed intervention reduces irreversible developmental damage from malnutrition and micronutrient deficiencies.