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The UN World Food Program (WFP) on Thursday dispatched a first plane loaded with medical supplies for developing countries especially vulnerable to the coronavirus pandemic, with the aim of increasing service to 350 flights per month.
WFP has selected nine airports worldwide to participate in the special humanitarian airlift, which will carry medical and humanitarian equipment from early May.
A cargo flight of the Boeing 757 left Belgium’s Liège airport on Thursday night loaded with 16 tons of medical supplies, including masks, gloves, medicines and syringes for the country of Burkina Faso in West Africa.
The grounding of commercial passenger flights during the pandemic has not only impeded the travel of tens of thousands of humanitarian workers, but has also eliminated cargo space.
“Today (the challenge) to find cargo planes is a nightmare. Prices have gone up four or five times,” said Amer Daoudi, WFP COVID-19 corporate response director. “You may not get it today, or the day after, or for a week.”
So WFP, which serves as the logistics arm of the UN system, has closed contracts for a long time to ensure that its flights operate and do so at reasonable cost.
“We need the capacity to serve many of the fragile countries around the world. This airlift will cover almost 120 countries,” said Daoudi.
Daoudi predicts that the flights will last three to four months, but could be extended. The airlift would stop if viable commercial alternatives returned.
Transportation is available to all workers and humanitarian health charges. Thursday’s supplies went to the UN children’s agency, UNICEF, and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Burkina Faso.
The other central airports are Accra, Addis Ababa, Guangzhou, Johannesburg, Panama City, Shanghai, Subang and two in Dubai.
