THE UNITED NATIONS WORLD FOOD

Published purpose

On December 17, 2011, Tropical Storm Washi (locally known as Sendong) made landfall on Mindanao in the Philippines. It brought torrential rains to this mountainous area, not accustomed to such storms. The rains triggered flash floods leading to significant destruction of houses, infrastructure and agriculture. As of January 3, 2012, a total of 724,729 people had been affected by flash floods in Mindanao and the official death toll stands at 1,257, with 4,658 injuries and 98 people missing. Fifty-four evacuation centres had been established, serving 431,304 displaced people. With CIDA's support, the World Food Programme (WFP) will increase the food security of 220,000 disaster-affected people and improve the nutritional status of 15,000 children under the age of five. Project activities include the large-scale distribution of emergency life-saving food assistance to the displaced population and the provision of supplementary feeding to malnourished children.