DEVELOPMENT REPORT - Aid Operation Bringing Food for the Hun

DEVELOPMENT REPORT - Aid Operation Bringing Food for the Hungry in Niger
By Jill Moss¹

Broadcast: Monday, August 01, 2005

I'm Barbara Klein with the VOA Special English Development Report.

Thousands of tons of emergency food aid is on its way to Niger. That country faces the greatest need in what the World Food Program calls a severe "hungry season" in West Africa. The crisis is the result of a combination of dry weather, civil conflict and the worst invasion of locusts² in fifteen years.

The World Food Program says two and one-half million people in Niger need help. Last week, the United Nations agency announced flights out of Italy and Ivory Coast to bring tons of food to Niamey, the capital. Also, food is arriving by ship in ports in Togo, Ghana and Benin, and being sent to Niger by truck.

Niger is one of the world's poorest countries. About eighty percent of its people depend on farming and raising cattle. But only fifteen percent of the land is good for farming. Now the insect invasion has destroyed crops and cattle grasslands³.

The World Food Program has expanded its feeding operation in Niger to more than one million people, three times the number as before. The agency says it warned as early as last November about the growing need for aid. But it says such warnings failed to bring an international reaction until recently.

Recent findings show that about three percent of children under age five in Niger and Mali suffer from severe malnutrition⁴. In some areas the rate is six percent.

The World Food Program says it urgently needs millions of dollars to prevent starvation in West Africa. The agency has appealed for sixteen million dollars in aid for Niger.

On July twenty-sixth the United States announced almost seven million dollars in additional emergency food aid for Niger. The Agency for International Development says about one million of it will go to feed mothers and children in the worst affected⁵ areas.

Locusts and a lack of rain have also ruined crops in Mali and Mauritania. The World Food Program says locusts invaded all of Mauritania's agricultural lands.

In Chad, the agency is feeding almost two hundred thousand refugees from the violence in Darfur, in western Sudan. Civil war in Ivory Coast and a political crisis in Togo have also created hungry refugees. And people are struggling to overcome the effects of conflict in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea and Guinea Bissau.

This VOA Special English Development Report was written by Jill Moss.  I'm Barbara Klein.

1 moss   

n.苔，藓，地衣

参考例句：

• Moss grows on a rock.苔藓生在石头上。
• He was found asleep on a pillow of leaves and moss.有人看见他枕着树叶和苔藓睡着了。

2 locusts   

n.蝗虫( locust的名词复数 )；贪吃的人；破坏者；槐树

参考例句：

• a swarm of locusts 一大群蝗虫
• In no time the locusts came down and started eating everything. 很快蝗虫就飞落下来开始吃东西，什么都吃。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 grasslands   

n.草原，牧场( grassland的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Songs were heard ringing loud and clear over the grasslands. 草原上扬起清亮激越的歌声。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• Grasslands have been broken and planted to wheat. 草原已经开垦出来，种上了小麦。 来自《简明英汉词典》

4 malnutrition   

n.营养不良

参考例句：

• In Africa, there are a lot of children suffering from severe malnutrition.在非洲有大批严重营养不良的孩子。
• It is a classic case of malnutrition. 这是营养不良的典型病例。

5 affected   

adj.不自然的，假装的

参考例句：

• She showed an affected interest in our subject.她假装对我们的课题感到兴趣。
• His manners are affected.他的态度不自然。