wfn.org | LWF and WFP sign agreement to join forces in food aid operations

[FRANK_IMHOFF.parti@ecunet.org (FRANK IMHOFF)]

WFP AND LUTHERAN WORLD FEDERATION
SIGN AGREEMENT TO JOIN FORCES
IN FOOD AID OPERATIONS

Geneva/Rome(Italy), 6. August 1998 - The UN World Food Programme (WFP) and
Lutheran World Federation (LWF) announced today they have agreed to
strengthen their collaboration in an effort to improve the effectiveness of
operations providing food aid to millions of people worldwide.

Catherine Bertini, Executive Director of WFP, and the Rev. Dr. Ismael Noko,
General Secretary of LWF, signed a Memorandum of Understanding on
Collaborative Working Arrangements at a ceremony in WFP Headquarters.

The agreement provides for the organizations to explore opportunities "for
joining forces to maximize the impact and quality" of their food aid
operations.

"In this era of new, more complex humanitarian crises coupled with
increasingly limited financial and material resources, we believe that
efficient and inventive steps need to be taken to best reach the people
most in need," Bertini and Noko said in a joint statement.

WFP and  LWF have cooperated for a number of years and are collaborating at
present on relief and development operations in Angola, Kenya, Liberia,
Mauritania, Malawi, Mozambique, Rwanda, southern Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda
and Zambia.

WFP, the United Nations' front-line agency in the fight against global
hunger, fed 53 million people in 84 countries last year, including most of
the world's refugees, at a total cost of US$1.2 billion.

LWF, a global communion of 124 Lutheran churches with 57 million members in
69 countries. In 1997 allocated through its Department for World Service
US$72 million in cash and US$16 million in donated commodities to emergency
and development programmes in 24 countries in 1997.WFP has signed similar
memoranda of understanding with 12 other non-governmental organizations.

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Lutheran World Information
Editorial Assistant: Janet Bond-Nash
E-mail: jbn@lutheranworld.org
http://www.lutheranworld.org/