Relief agencies distribute food in urban centres

World Vision Zimbabwe has announced a new urban school feeding programme, which the organisation aims to launch in November. The feeding scheme, funded by the UN World Food Programme (WFP), forms part of World Vision's urban intervention in Zimbabwe. Zvidzai Maburutse, the World Vision Zimbabwe Relief Deputy Director, said in a statement that the programme was set to kick off at the beginning of November. "We are going to use the lessons drawn from this pilot program to expand into other urban schools," he added. This is the first time the organisation will be implementing a school feeding programme in an urban environment. Previously its focus has been on the rural areas, where an estimated 4.4 million people currently need food aid. Maburutse said the intervention was coming at a time when food insecurity in urban centres was becoming increasingly desperate, and school children had been identified as one of the most vulnerable groups. "Urban vulnerability, fuelled by the declining economy, has continued to slide and households have been forced to come up with strategies to survive. It is estimated that 1.1 million people in urban centres are in urgent need of food aid," World Vision said. The school feeding intervention will augment already existing programmes being run by other humanitarian agencies in the city. Last month Catholic Relief Services launched a Market Assistance Pilot Program (MAPP) to reduce urban vulnerability in Zimbabwe's second city, Bulawayo. "The MAPP programme, which is funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), is bringing in 20,000 mt of sorghum into the country. The sorghum is going to be milled and placed in strategic retail outlets and sold to the public at subsidised rates," World Vision said. The WFP is also running supplementary feeding in 37 clinics dotted across the city, reaching out to over 25,000 children under five years of age.