NAIROBI - The UN World Food Programme (WFP) on Wednesday said it is scaling up delivery of relief food to hundreds of thousands of people in western Sudan's Darfur region as the rainy season begins to bite.
"In order to meet the challenge in Darfur, WFP is urgently scaling up its operation into the region, with particular emphasis being placed on El-Geneina, the capital of West Darfur, the state worst affected by the rains," WFP said in a statement.
The WFP representative in Sudan, Ramiro Lopes da Silva, said delivery of food to the region by air is expensive, but the only option at this time of the year.
"The next six weeks will be critical as the rainy season really begins to bite, we have a massive task ahead of us," the statement sent to AFP quoted Da Silva as saying. WFP started dropping food to inaccessible areas in Darfur in the first week of August.
"From today, WFP will be using three Antonov 12 cargo planes to airlift 100 tonnes of food per day to El-Geneina. The three planes are to complete three rotations per day," the statement added.
The agency warned that if weather conditions continue to worsen, the runway in El-Geneina will become unusable.
"A third helicopter has arrived in Sudan to assist in the transportation of drop-zones teams into locations where air drops are to be received," the statement said.
The UN estimates that up to 50,000 people have been killed in Darfur since rebels rose up in February 2003 against the government in Khartoum, which responded with attacks carried out by a proxy militia on tribes backing the rebellion.
Another 1.2 million people have fled their villages in Sudan and up to 200,000 more have been settled in makeshift camps in equally impoverished eastern Chad, the UN said.
WFP, which in the past complained that armed assailants looted relief supplies from its trucks, said the first 21 of 120 all-terrain trucks will leave Khartoum for El-Geneina on Wednesday.
"The trailer trucks are loaded with corn-soya blend, a micronutrient-rich foodstuff, particulary important in reinforcing the diets of young children, pregnant and breast-feeding mothers and the elderly," the statement explained.
"The second batch of all-terrain trucks is being cleared in Port Sudan and will proceed via Khartoum to El Geneina," it added.
El Geneina is one of six bases where an African Union force, tasked with protecting ceasefire observers in Darfur, will be stationed. Already, 150 Rwandan troops have arrived and a similar number of Nigerian soldiers are expected later this month.
WFP also said it had signed letters of agreement with the Danish Refugee Council, Tearfund, Action Contre la Faim, World Vision and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) to improve the distribution of relief supplies in the vast region, the size of France.
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