Joint mission to assess IDP needs

A team of UN, NGO and Guinean officials on Wednesday began evaluating lingering problems and food security needs, of various groups affected by armed conflict and floods in Guinea. The evaluation mission includes FAO, OCHA, UNICEF and WFP, Guinea's government, and Premiere Urgence, a French NGO. Its aim is to pinpoint the location and needs of displaced persons, returnees and host communities, WFP's representative in Guinea, Gemmo Lodesani, told IRIN on Thursday. The teams's findings will help the partners formulate specific aid activities for January-May 2002, he said. The mission, to last until 22 December, will cover Beyla, Kankan, Mandiana (east), Dabola and Farannah (centre), Dinguiraye (north-central), and N'zerekore (south). It will also travel to Gueckedou, the Parrot's Beak and Kissidougou - volatile areas near the Liberian border where armed incursions between September 2000 and March 2001 led to the displacement of thousands of people. Floods in the Kankan region in September and October also affected some 200,000 people. The needs of people displaced by those floods will also be assessed during this mission. The humanitarian situation in Guinea is now relatively stable but a "high level of vulnerability" remains because of lingering instability in neighbouring Liberia and Sierra Leone, Lodesani said. WFP continues to distribute food to thousands of recipients under various programmes. Lodesani also told IRIN that WFP now provides an air transport service for UN personnel, media professionals, NGOs, and others involved in activities that require movement in the country. The service facilitates the work of these various actors by alleviating the transportation factor - a major burden in Guinea because of bad roads. WFP would like to provide this service, free of charge for 12 months. But current funding would only allow the service to run until February. Of the US $1.25 million needed, the service has so far received $450,000 from the governments of the United States and Ireland, Lodesani said.