$30b World Bank food project to tackle food insecurity
By Jeph Ajobaju, Chief Copy Editor
A total $30 billion has been budgeted by the World Bank to fund existing and new projects in Nigeria and other countries, part of the lender’s global plan to tackle food insecurity.
The World Bank said it is working with countries on new projects worth $12 billion for the next 15 months to support agriculture, social protection against high food prices, as well as water and irrigation projects.
Most of the funds would go to Africa, the Middle East, Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and South Asia.
“This financing will include efforts to encourage food and fertilizer production, enhance food systems, facilitate greater trade, and support vulnerable households and producers,” World Bank Group President David Malpass explained.
“Food price increases are having devastating effects on the poorest and most vulnerable.
“To inform and stabilise markets, it is critical that countries make clear statements now of future output increases in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“Countries should make concerted efforts to increase the supply of energy and fertilizer, help farmers increase plantings and crop yields, and remove policies that block exports and imports, divert food to biofuel, or encourage unnecessary storage.”
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Current portfolio
Malpass said the current portfolio of the World Bank includes balances of $18.7 billion in projects with direct links to food and nutrition security issues, agriculture and natural resources, nutrition, social protection, and other sectors, per The PUNCh
“Altogether, this would amount to over $30 billion available for implementation to address food insecurity over the next 15 months. This response will draw on the full range of Bank financing instruments and be complemented by analytical work.”
82.4m Nigerians now deeper in poverty
Poverty has enlarged itself and swallowed 82.4 million people into its suffocating bowels in Nigeria where only 17 per cent of workers earn enough to get yanked off the jaws of impoverishment, the World Bank disclosed in a report in March.
Deep, practical, and visible structural reforms have to be implemented urgently to reverse the situation in which 4 out 10 Nigerians live below the poverty line, the World Bank counselled.
World Bank Country Director for Nigeria Shubham Chaudhuri insisted in the report, titled “A Better Future for All Nigerians: Nigeria Poverty Assessment 2022”, that pro-poor policies should be implemented.
The policies, he stressed, should unlock fiscal space, reform expensive subsidies, and incorporate countervailing measures to protect the poor.
