WFP and UNFPA donation arrives in Easter Cuba

SANTIAGO DE CUBA, Cuba, November 16 (ACN) A shipment of humanitarian aid sent by the World Food Programme (WFP) and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) arrived in the city of Santiago de Cuba to bolster recovery efforts in the eastern provinces hit by Hurricane Melissa.

The donation, brought from Panama, includes 1,625 tarpaulins for temporary roof coverings, 600 mosquito nets, four fumigation units, four thermal foggers, and 10 emergency trauma backpacks for purposes of epidemiological control.

The shipment also includes sixteen 16-kVa diesel generators, six mobile storage units for the hardest-hit areas, 200 family tents, eight water tanks, and two lighting systems.

According to Rolando Verdés, a member of the WFP emergency team, this is the second of three flights scheduled to complete the delivery as part of an operation facilitated by funds provided by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and the European Union intended to replenish the resources used by the organization in its early response to Hurricane Melissa.

The WFP, as leader of logistics within the UN Cuba Office, has deployed specialists to coordinate the humanitarian flights and support the assembly of the mobile warehouses in the provinces of Santiago de Cuba, Holguín, and Granma.

On her end, Madelaine Cortés Barquilla, Director of Foreign Trade, Foreign Investment, and International Cooperation in the province of Santiago de Cuba, expressed her gratitude for the support received to cope with the complex situation facing a region where more than 100,000 homes, crops and roads were severely damaged and stressed that international solidarity is crucial as the Cuban people suffer from considerable shortages in the aftermath of the storm.

This aid is part of the international cooperation that complements Cuba’s recovery efforts and the actions under way to protect the population of the eastern provinces.