"The World Food Program, the United Nations agency responsible for feeding three million people affected by the conflict in Darfur, in western Sudan, announced Friday that it would cut in half the amount of food it distributed there because it was short of money.
The food program said it had received just a third of the $746 million it had requested from donor nations for all of its operations in Sudan. As a result, individual rations that include grain, blended foods, beans, oil, sugar and salt for people in Darfur, where a brutal ethnic and political conflict has raged since 2003, will be reduced from 2,100 calories a day to 1,050 calories — about half the level the agency recommends.
In March, the agency announced an initial cut of sugar, salt and beans to some Darfur residents, but that reduction did not include grain, blended foods or oil, the rations' main sources of calories."
Describing the events during the joint annual meeting of the Boards of Governors of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund attended by 10,000 people.
"The total cost of the 700 social events laid on for delegates during that single week was estimated at $10 million..... Ridgewells, a well known Washington catering company, prepared twenty nine parties in one day alone, according to executive Jeff Ellis who added: 'This year the hosts want more expensive menus, and they're inviting 30 per cent more people. No one is stinting -- but, then, they never have." A single formal dinner catered by Ridgewells cost $200 per person. Guests began with crab cakes, caviare and creme fraiche, smoked salmon and mini beef Wellingtons. The fish course was lobster with corn rounds followed by citrus sorbet. The entree was duck with lime sauce, served with artichoke bottoms filled with baby carrots. A hearts of palm salad was also offered accompanied by sage cheese souffles with a port wine dressing. Dessert was a German chocolate turnip sauced with raspberry coulis, ice-cream bonbons and flaming coffee royale." (38)
No comments:
Post a Comment