Gay Mitchell
Question:62 Mr. G. Mitchell asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs if he will make a statement on the contents of a letter (details supplied) and state the assistance his Department can give in this regard. [8445/01]
Written Answers. - Overseas Development Aid.
Following the publication of Sister Keane's letter in The Irish Times, the issue raised concerning the Ndola Ecumenical Hospice in Zambia was taken up with the World Food Programme through its headquarters in Rome, and an explanation was sought. The WFP has informed us that it received a proposal for a hospital feeding project from Sister Keane in November 2000 which included feeding both terminally ill patients and orphans.
WFP has told us that, while it has succeeded in providing some assistance to deal with food insecure HIV-AIDS patients, its available resources are very scarce and that difficult choices have to be made. In this case, the WFP took the difficult decision to focus the limited food resources which were available on the orphans. It requested Sister Keane to split her proposal in two for project purposes – one for the terminally ill patients and one for the orphans. I understand the project for orphans was included in the WFP December distribution plan and will continue to receive food. I have asked our Embassy in Zambia to monitor the situation to assess whether any further intervention on our part is necessary.
This case is a stark example of the difficult choices many UN agencies are confronted with when donor resources are in decline. The lack of resources severely hampers their ability to address the many needs of developing countries, especially in Africa. For our part, Ireland has been steadily increasing its contributions to UN organisations, including the WFP. Our regular contributions to the WFP, which are provided by the Department of Agriculture, Food and Rural Development have been increased considerably. Our contribution agreed under the food aid convention has increased by more than 60% to a total of £1.2 million. The annual voluntary donation was increased in 2000 by 30% to £1.3 million, giving a total of £2.5 million.
In addition, the Ireland Aid programme also provides funding in response to WFP emergency appeals. In 2000, £2.6 million was provided. The Minister of State, Deputy O'Donnell also recently announced an additional £2.35 million for the WFP to fund its emergency appeals to help some of the areas of the world most threatened by famine and starvation.
We are also sharply increasing our funding on HIV-AIDS activities to UN organisations, international research into a vaccine and in our bilateral programmes.
However, Ireland on its own cannot resolve the problem of declining donor resources and the wider donor community must also address the funding deficit if UN agencies are to be in a position to meet the many demands on their resources.