WEST AFRICA: World's poorest region needs $300m in aid this
year - UN
Source: IRIN
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DAKAR, 5 December (IRIN) - The United Nations and relief NGOs in West Africa have jointly asked donors for US $309 million in aid for 2007 to keep
humanitarian projects rolling in the region's 16 poorest countries.The appeal is made annually and covers the requirements for the agriculture, food, water, health and human rights projects overseen
by the UN and all its partners.The Consolidated Annual Appeal (CAP) covers the needs of the West African region, where 250 million people live in the landlocked and dirt poor countries that form the
arid Sahel region, as well as coastal Liberia, Guinea-Bissau and Sierra Leone, which are emerging from conflict, and the politically unstable Cote d'Ivoire and Nigeria.In West African countries such
as Liberia and Niger, foreign-funded health, sanitation and feeding projects help keep people alive as they grapple with shrinking agriculture productivity, mounting inflation, the decline of
traditional industries, and the resurgence of forgotten illnesses such as cholera and yellow fever.Even with donor assistance, in most countries in the region, at least one in every five children
born will die from preventable diseases such as malaria and diarrhoea, or will simply starve to death. Many million more children suffer physical and mental retardation from living with malnutrition.The region's countries frequently come last in the UN's Human Development Index, which ranks living standards by life expectancy, and access to health and education services. In the UN children's
agency (UNICEF) index, the State of the World's Children, West African countries consistently perform poorly in the education, health and nutritional sectors for children under five. Speaking at the
appeal's launch in Dakar on Tuesday, Amedou Ould Abdallah, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan's special representative to West Africa, linked the region's humanitarian problems to stability.In the year
ahead, nine West African countries will hold one or more rounds of presidential, parliamentary and local polls. Elections are "periods of tension" Abdallah warned."We must work together in many
areas, including humanitarian, agriculture, health and refugees, not just diplomatically, to assure security," he said. "We need to talk about the problems of the region. We must maintain stability in
the region to create a good environment for the elections."West Africa has traditionally been well-treated by donors, according to figures from the UN's humanitarian coordination agency (OCHA). Last
year 87 percent of the money requested was provided by Brussels, London, Washington, Paris, Tokyo and elsewhere.About 40 percent of the 2007 appeal is for food aid. However, aid agency chiefs have
recently criticised donors for over-concentrating on food at the expense of other equally important life-saving projects, such as providing clean water sources and washing facilities to help prevent
the spread of disease.OCHA has identified food security and nutrition, sanitation, and population movements as the region's main priorities for the year ahead.nr/cs
