MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

World Bank grant for Haiti to prop social safety net programs

The World Bank announced Sunday a 10 million US dollar grant for Haiti to help the Government respond to the increasing, unaffordable prices of food for poor families.

In Haiti, the prices of rice, corn, beans, cooking oil and other foodstuffs have increased significantly in the last few months.

"With this new ten million grant, the World Bank will support Government efforts to rapidly scale up social safety net programs, including school feeding, while pursuing longer term measures to create jobs", said Yvonne Tsikata, the World Bank Country Director for the Caribbean. According to a recently released report, Rising Food Prices: Policy Options and World Bank Response, increases in world wheat prices reached 181% over the 36 months leading up to February 2008, and overall global food prices increased by 83%. The protection and subsidization of the production of grains for bio-fuels, the increased costs of diesel fuel and fertilizer, and bad weather in traditionally big food production regions have been among the factors triggering the world-wide food price increases. The World Bank also announced that a team of experts will visit Haiti in the coming days to work with the Government and its international partners to put the emergency assistance in place. The grant is expected to cover the provision of food for poor children and other vulnerable groups, partly through an expansion of the Bank's existing school feeding program; and job creation through labor intensive public works. The World Bank is also exploring hedging instruments for food imports. Since 2005, the World Bank has provided approximately 220 million US dollars of support to Haiti.