The World Food Programme Staff Magazine

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The Extra MileFocus on staffers who go above and beyond See page 2

N. 50May 2011

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Front cover caption:Aboubacar Guindo, a school meals programmeofficer in Mali, is known as a forceful andpersuasive advocate for WFP's school mealsprogrammes. He is shown here with one of themore than 131,000 school children helped byWFP in Mali. WFP/Anne Sophie Noten

Petra Miczaika (top) and Georgia Shaver

were, respectively, WFP’s first staff counselor

and first ombudsman. As they retire, they

will be missed by the hundreds of staffers

they have helped over the years. They

exemplify the spirit of “the extra mile”.

Farewell to Two PassionateStaff Advocates

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by Jennifer Parmelee

Twenty years ago, when I was working as a journalist, a

plane dropped me in the badlands of Ethiopia’s Ogaden

region, where catastrophe had struck. I was new to

Africa and to starvation on a wide scale — searing a

memory I’ve never shaken. Cut off from the rest of the

world, I interviewed the aid workers and the victims,

took notes, and returned to my hotel to cry. When I

could observe no more, I tried to help the aid workers

who were stretched way beyond capacity. Aggravated by

the chaotic end of Ethiopia’s civil war, hunger and

related diseases were claiming dozens of lives every

day. The situation was so desperate that mothers in rags

hurled themselves at passing vehicles, screaming for

help.

At one hard-pressed emergency feeding center, I stood

in a room filled with young children — but bathed in an

unnatural silence, as if someone had cut off the volume

during a nightmarish scene on TV. A few little souls

summoned the strength to cry out. But most sat or lay

quietly, their wizened, hollow-eyed faces stripped of

animation. Many children bore septic wounds on their

stomachs, where parents had burned them with

cigarettes to “take away” the hunger pangs.

Eventually, my story and photographs made p. 1 of The

Washington Post and the flow of emergency relief

increased, turning back the tide of death. Yet it was far

too late for the many children who had died in the

weeks, even months, before the world beyond, we

journalists included, finally paid attention. That was the

start of a journey that ultimately led me to WFP, a place

where at least I was not merely observing and

cataloguing Africa’s litany of woes.

In journalism, only half-jokingly, we used to call that

“crossing over to the side of the angels.”

Twenty years ago, Mohamed “Mandiid” Mohamud

arrived in the Ogaden amid the same dreadful

famine, but before any aid effort was launched. When an

official from Irish Concern finally arrived to make an

assessment, Mandiid was blunt: before any assessment,

at the minimum, they must open a feeding center for

children. The official agreed, but said they had no food

to give. Using his wits, Mandiid managed to borrow food

from a local government warehouse and the emergency

center opened the very next day to treat the worst-

affected children, pregnant and nursing mothers.

At the time, Mandiid was working for a small farmers

cooperative in the Ogaden, a region of perpetual

drought, violence and suffering that one refugee told me

“Allah has forgotten all about.” He moonlighted as guide,

interpreter, cameraman, for the few journalists who

ventured that way — which was how we met all those

years ago. In January 2011, we reconnected after he

sent me an email from WFP’s Gode sub-office. I

recognized his face instantly from the grainy black-and-

white photo he sent me, and we traded news about our

families. But how was it he was still in Gode?

I thought back to all the people I’d met who couldn’t

wait to transfer out of the Ogaden to more hospitable

posts. I thought about how the continuing spillover from

Somalia’s cauldron had escalated the dangers, especially

to relief workers. The risks borne by our team there

were tragically underscored on 13 May 2011, when a

driver from the Jijiga sub-office — Farhan Hamsa —

was killed by unknown assailants who attacked a WFP

convoy. The 44-year-old Farhan, an Ethiopian national,

left behind a wife and seven children.

Mandiid told me his original plan was to stay for just two

years. “But I cancelled that plan and decided to stay and

assist as much as I can for the poor people here,” he

said simply.

Mandiid is one of the many, many staff members of WFP

who exemplify the spirit of this issue of Pipeline, “The

Extra Mile — staff who go above and beyond” the call of

duty. As a journalist, I was always struck that in every

trench, relief tent or hellhole we reached, WFP was

always on the frontlines. Invariably, staffers were

enormously helpful and kind to us interlopers in spite of

often-uncomfortable working conditions and round-the-

clock workloads, shouldered without complaint.

In such places, I first met Brenda Barton, who

headed to Africa in 1992 as WFP’s first-ever public

information officer in the field. Foreign correspondents

depended on Brenda to give them not only reliable

frontlines information, but also help them get transport

and accommodation in the remote locales where they

met up. Although she had to also juggle the demands of

a young family in Nairobi and frequently came under

enormous pressure in risky locations, Brenda never lost

her composure, her command of the facts — nor, most

importantly, her compassion. I vividly remember when,

confronted with the heart-rending sight of a

malnourished baby in south Sudan whose mother could

not provide milk, Brenda — whose own son was still tiny

and breastfeeding — quietly took the child aside and

nursed her. As a mother, Brenda found it impossible to

simply stand aside. (Brenda, now deputy director of

communications, will depart the communications team

after nearly two decades to become deputy regional

director in Johannesburg).

When we decided on the theme of this issue, we realized

that WFP offered an embarrassment of riches to mine for

these stories. The profiles from the annual All-Staff

Awards that lead off this section bring many of these

heroes to light, but many more remain unsung. In the

words of Peter Schaller, who won the 2010 Tun Myat

award: “It is difficult to find a colleague in WFP who does

not thrive on a challenge; who does not manage to

exceed their own expectations when facing the huge

challenges during an emergency.”

Many staffers who, while on the job in the field, are

touched by the children they meet — and respond

beyond the job requirements, like Edgar Tanchez

(p. 4). One is former national officer Natalia Correia

Vera-Cruz, of Cape Verde, who spotted school feeding

recipient Vera Tavares as a child, and nudged her along

a path that ultimately won her a university scholarship.

Or DRC’s Freddy Bwanahali, bowled over by a little

boy, Aruna, who compared school meals to “a windfall

that comes from heaven, as the one fell for the children

of Israel in the desert”. Freddy still supports Aruna’s

studies three years later. Or Kenyan Grace Igweta,

who is mentoring Abigel, a Turkana girl, and five other

children through school to ensure they fulfill their

potential.

Executive Director Josette Sheeran, speaking during the

recent All-Staff Awards, recalled how her father

observed that people often discover their greatest

strengths when they are tested. In her words: “It is

really quite sacred to be in the presence of greatness

that has been found.”

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Going theExtra Mile

At the ceremony for the 2010 All-Staff Awards

Snapped:Staff in ActionLalBabu Mishra (left) and Ramesh Balayar

(right) returning from a 3-hour trek to monitor a

school in the remote Bajura district of the Far

Western region of Nepal. Both are WFP

programme staff in the Dadeldhura sub-office

and often spend days hiking up steep mountains

and crossing treacherous bridges to reach

children in rural schools participating in the

school feeding programme. Road networks in

these parts are very poor, hampering the

delivery of services to rural and remote

communities. However, the WFP Nepal team

continues to reach children in food-deficit areas

with a bowl of nutritious porridge on every

school day. Ramesh grew up in what is called a

‘hilly area’ of this region and enjoys the hike and

long treks. LalBabu on the other hand grew up

in the plains or ‘terai’ and has had to adjust to

life in the hilly area.

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by Jordan Cox

In June of 2009, a WFP food convoy set out on the

Sobat river in South Sudan. As the 27 boats reached a

stretch of the river close to the Ethiopian border, a local

militia stopped their progress. The militia was mostly

younger men and boys — called the White Army —

brandishing rifles they often used in livestock raids.

And the White Army was suspicious. There were dozens

of soldiers from the Sudan People’s Liberation Army —

or SPLA — escorting the shipment, and no one from

WFP. Things got worse when the militia discovered who

the convoy was destined for: the Luo Nuer, the very

tribe that had raided them only weeks before.

Gunfire broke out and the militia badly ambushed the

convoy. When the shooting finished, about 100 people

were dead — dozens of SPLA soldiers and civilians too.

Some barges sunk to the river floor, others turned back,

and all commercial and aid traffic on the river was

immediately shut down. Still in need of a way to deliver,

WFP resorted to air drops that were able to transport

only a fraction of the food needed.

And if it weren’t for Mark Diang, a former child soldier

now working for WFP as a security assistant in Malakal,

those air drops might have gone on far longer. For his

efforts in reopening the dangerous river passage and

keeping traffic moving ever since, WFP awarded him the

2010 Award of Merit.

Born in 1981 in Bentiu, South Sudan, Mark was recruited

into the SPLA before he was a teenager. After making it

out, he worked for Medecins Sans Frontières and the

UNCHR before joining WFP in late 2008.

Now, just three months after the ambush, and with WFP

ready to find out if the river was safe for travel, Mark

stepped up. Security was reluctant, but “we believed it

could work,” said Henry Chamberlain, a security

coordinator in South Sudan. For their first assessment,

“we travelled all the way down there — Mark and I, plus

some UNDSS security officers — and we brought along

the main tribal chief of the Jikany Nuer.”

The river had yet to reopen, and tensions ran high. The

groups involved in the conflict are part of the greater

Nuer people — the militia that attacked the convoy was

made up of various communities of Jikany Nuer, while

the food was destined for people of the Luo Nuer tribe.

Fortunately, Mark is Nuer himself, which became crucial

in the days and weeks ahead.

Mark knew these communities and helped open a lot of

doors. “Mark has a good rapport with the chief — they

communicate well,” said Henry. “That was enough to

gain access to the communities along the river. And it

was Mark, going in and talking with them, that convinced

these communities it was possible to work with us.”

Mark explained his approach. “We would go and say,

‘We’re the World Food Programme, we have no part in

whatever conflict you have, whether tribal or political —

we’re just here to support needy people.’” His honesty

worked. “I’d sit down on the ground with young men, I

call them ‘quor’ — it means boss, or big man in the Nuer

dialect. I’m one of them — I made myself very simple.”

Mark worked hard to build trust. “I suggested I go with

the convoys,” he said, so the tribe would know that

someone from WFP — someone they could trust — was

taking the food down. “Now, whenever we have any

convoys, we make sure someone from WFP is on board,

and I give the communities [along the river] a phone

number to call, so we can let them know we’re coming.”

And almost always, that "someone" travelling with the

convoy has been Mark himself. “Mark would go on his

own with the WFP boats and the tribal chief, and he’d let

the communities know there were no issues, no

problems in going back and forth with the food. He must

have taken 3 or 4 big convoys down and back in

September and October,” said Henry.

Once convoys were able to pass through the area

unmolested, the river was opened again. By September,

air drops had stopped, and river traffic has been moving

ever since.

Mark’s work paid off in other ways, too. He found out

“the militia’s communities weren’t getting food,” said

Henry. Once Mark worked to “boost the relationship and

trust between WFP and [the tribes]”, he could help WFP

better track who else needed help in the area.

The river passage to Akobo might be calmer now, but

Mark hasn't let his guard down. After the first successful

trip, Mark readied a second convoy — and as he

travelled to Akobo, he was detained at gunpoint by a

similar militia. There had been Luo Nuer attacks just

days before. Thankfully Mark had heard about the

situation already: “[The communities] called and told

me, ‘Mark, we don’t know whether you can pass now,'”

he said. Eventually, they made it through — because he

knew the situation in advance, he could negotiate the

convoy's safe passage.

His direct approach — working with local militias to

provide security rather than relying on escorts — doesn’t

always fit the standard rulebook. “It’s an example of

what can be achieved when you bring some lateral

thinking to solving a problem,” said Henry, “and it’s

really important for WFP. There are lots of different and

better ways we can get our business done.”

Contents

Pipeline: WFPgo In Print is a product of Internal

Communications, a unit of the Communications,

Public Policy and Private Partnerships Division. This

newsletter comes out three times a year, sharing

the most interesting, relevant news and features

from WFPgo, with a new cover story. We welcome

ideas for WFPgo stories. If you have suggestions,

please write to internal.communications@wfp.org Pip

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Sudan Security Without aMilitary Escort

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A Logistics MasterPakistan VAM

Award-Winning Teams in Haiti and Kyrgyzstan

Edgar’s World in GuatemalaSecurity Team’s Charity Drives

Radio Trainer Wires Hot ZonesHawa Returns Home

Turmoil Across the Near East

Japan QuakeThe Younger Generations

Liberia Football7 Security Facts Everyone Should Know in 2011

The EB RevealedGreen Corner

Highlights of Pipeline’s First 50 issues

The Extra Mile section opens with the stories of the winners of the 2010 Awards of Merit: Haiti’s Country Office and the broader WFP Haiti team; Farhod Haidarov,Asel Omorova and Aibek Saidov of the Osh, Kyrgyzstan sub-office; Pakistan’s VAMteam; and Security Assistant Mark Diang of Sudan. Also included is Peter Schaller,winner of the 2010 Tun Myat Award for Excellence in Humanitarian Logistics. Thissection continues with profiles of other staffers who go “above and beyond”.

Burk Oberle, retiring Kenya country

director, is 'installed' as a Masai elder

during his farewell party in March 2011.

Burk's career spanned 32 years with WFP.

Snapped:Staff in Action

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By Leighla Bowers

With an unassuming

appearance, a serene

disposition, and

“uniform” of worn

jeans and plaid

button-down, you

wouldn’t guess Peter

Schaller is the man

behind WFP’s entire

h u m a n i t a r i a n

operation during the intense 2010 Pakistan floods. But his

passion for the work he does —and the people whose lives

he works to save — is undeniable.

When flash floods engulfed over 240 bridges in Northern

Pakistan in one day, Peter coordinated food assistance to

more than 10 million people. So when he calls the massive

logistics response to the 2010 floods one of the “least

demanding” operations he’s ever coordinated, it’s OK to be

surprised.

Peter is the first to tell you that the words “impossible” and

“logistics” don’t belong in the same sentence. Dropping

food out of helicopters onto the rooftops of flooded areas,

rebuilding roads and bridges in mountainous terrain and

navigating through countries rocked by civil war and

genocide — he knows no limits.

Peter showed his ability to rally and motivate a team from

his very first assignment in Sudan. “He’s a natural leader,”

says Chief of Aviation Pierre Carasse, who hired him. After

Sudan, Peter moved on to the Democratic Republic of

Congo (DRC). “He played a key role in the DRC, where he

was responsible for the whole logistics operation in the

eastern part of the country — and in a time of permanent

fighting. He managed to have food reach the beneficiaries

against all odds and under the most difficult and

dangerous conditions. Peter never gives up,” says Pierre.

As an ex-Austrian military commander, he’s used to

unstable, high-stress situations. He’s organized food aid in

the middle of chaos: warring militias, hijacked

humanitarian trucks and bands of child soldiers. When

faced with danger, the last thing Peter wants to do is stay

home. “Too many need our help,” he says. And

experiences like the drive-by shooting that taught him to

always sit facing the street — even for a five-minute coffee

inside a bar — have made him who he is today.

He also knows how important the help and support of a

team is to any manager. And without his team, he knows

he wouldn’t have received the 2010 Tun Myat Award for

Excellence in Humanitarian Logistics, awarded in Rome on

24 March 2011.

“Each and everyone is equally deserving of this

acknowledgement. It is especially humbling to receive

recognition for a role that I feel such pride and privilege to

fulfill. In receiving this award, I would like to say that we

achieve this by having the right people with the right

attitude under the right leadership,“ he says.

Calm, Serene –And A LogisticsMaster

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As Sahib Haq headed to Peshawar, Pakistan, the

morning of 28 July 2010 and spied the rapidly swelling

Kabul River, he quickly realized the torrential rains

were not the usual monsoon. To his horror, he saw the

floodwaters surrounding his home Nowshera district; a

phone call to relatives confirmed the area was being

engulfed from all directions. “All my thoughts were for

my family,” Sahib recalls. ”But then I realized that we

needed to help so many others who were fighting for

their lives in this devastating situation.”

Sahib, programme officer with the Vulnerability

Assessment Mapping (VAM) unit, rushed to WFP’s

provincial office and, working with partner NGOs in the

area who provided field monitors, was able to launch

an emergency assessment that same afternoon. “At

that time, not even the government knew about the

severity of the flooding,” he recalls. Within three days,

they completed a first assessment of the hard-hit

Peshawar Valley, surveying 100 percent of the

villages.These were the early hours of what was to

become the worst flood in the history of Pakistan,

where monsoon-swollen rivers burst their banks and

raged across more than half the country. In the end,

1,600 people lost their lives as the flooding destroyed

thousands of villages — sweeping away farms and

homes, livestock and crops, homes and household

possessions.

“I reached Punjab on the day flooding hit the area. The

scene was unbearable and a big challenge to

humanity,” Sahib recalls. ”I saw thousands of families

with women and children scrambling to reach safety,

and desperately searching for food and potable water.

After the 2005 earthquake, this was the second biggest

human catastrophe I witnessed and I felt it very

strongly. The suffering, the cries of people, especially

of children and women, are still in my memories. It

was satisfying when I could help by distributing high

energy biscuits.”

Countless victims desperately needed emergency food

— but first, somebody had to count them. That’s where

the Pakistan VAM team, led by Sahib, an experienced

national staffer, and Laura de Franchis from the

Netherlands, swung into action, launching a vast data

collection initiative unique in scope and rapidity.

From the initial days in Sahib’s Peshawar Valley, the

VAM team worked around the clock to keep pace with

the swiftly expanding floods, mobilizing more than

1000 enumerators from 88 NGO partners. In the end,

they covered more than 11,000 villages in north and

central Pakistan. Along the way, the teams not only

collected data, but were able to alert the Pakistani

army and government so they could rescue people

trapped by the floodwaters.

It was this demonstration of speed, dedication and skill

— as well as superb teamwork — that has resulted in

an Award of Merit to Pakistan’s VAM team. Thanks to

their exceptional work during and after the flooding —

and in spite of 20 million people hit hard — there was

no catastrophic outbreak of hunger. Their work also

enabled farmers in the flood zones to return to their

fields in the wake of the catastrophe and stave off

future hunger.

Laura says the massive Initial Vulnerabil ity

Assessment, or IVA, was “an incredible piece of

organization and mobilization, with teams rolling out

and relaying their assessments back almost in ‘real

time,’ as the floods spread across the country. Just

about everyone involved in the relief efforts including

the government relied on the data collected by the

IVA.”

Critical to the speed and efficiency of the assessment

was the questionnaire designed by Sahib, which

gathered the most basic and essential data in the

shortest amount of time, Laura said. “It was not just

the scale of the IVA that was remarkable but the

methodology,” she says. “The questionnaire was really

simple — for example, ‘Was your house destroyed, yes

or no’ — so that we could get a quick snapshot of how

many houses were destroyed and how many people

displaced. It was beautiful in its simplicity and very

effective.”

As the teams navigated the flooded areas by foot,

donkey or boat — and the numbers poured in — the

VAM unit’s nine-member team, backed up by VAM

officers in HQ and the regional bureau, worked against

time. Alongside Sahib and Laura, the VAM unit

included: Afsheen Anwar and Tehreem Sheikh — two

women who did everything from slogging through the

waters to make assessments to crunching the data

back in the Islamabad office; a mapping team

comprised of Fawad Raza, Sarah Bashir and

Mohammad Siddique; and Khadim Shah and Amanur

Rehman who came in later on the assessment side.

“This was already a very dedicated and experienced

team that didn’t get discouraged easily,” says Joyce

Luma, chief of the Food Security Analysis Service in

Rome, supervising VAM units worldwide “This team

worked frequently in dangerous, conflict-affected

areas. They went ahead with their assessments in spite

of circumstances that might have defeated others —

including the persistent threat of conflict and terrorist

strikes.”

Joyce says instability in many flooded areas made data

collection even more challenging. “It was a huge

natural disaster, but there were so many underlying

elements, like conflict and displacement, that would

make any assessment very complicated,” she says.

In spite of the challenges, the team managed to

pinpoint how many people needed food assistance

across the country within four short weeks. This

information was invaluable for the multitude of relief

workers from different agencies, as well as the

government. Both donors and the government, in fact,

recognized that, of all the aid agencies in Pakistan at

the height of the crisis, only WFP knew what was

needed and had a detailed and concrete plan to

address those needs.

“It was really a unique operation in that WFP provided

the technical leadership in design, collection and

analysis of the data,” Joyce says. “We were able to be

effective as leaders because this team really knew

what they were doing.” An added strength of the team,

she said, came from Country Director Wolfgang

Herbinger, who by coincidence was a former chief of

needs assessment in headquarters. “This clarity and

guidance from senior management really helped,” she

said. “He could say, “This is what we need: Go get it.”

As the emergency subsided, there was still the

question of long-term food security. Two months after

the floods, WFP called a conference in Islamabad to

send a clear message: Farmers needed to get back to

their land for the new planting season. With

floodwaters receding, WFP distributed food to millions

of people to encourage their return to their villages,

rebuild their houses and prepare their fields. The Food

and Agriculture Organization provided seeds and

fertilizer, and by December, almost 90 percent of

farmers were back in business. Thanks to the VAM

unit, fears of a massive crop failure faded, and

Pakistan expects a good harvest this spring.

Pakistan's VAM Team: the Life-Saving Numbers

Supporters Can Now"Feed Back" to hungrychildren atwefeedback.org

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By Stephanie Tremblay

On 12 January 2010, at exactly 16:53, it took 35

seconds of rumbling to change the face of Haiti. The

earthquake left more than 220,000 people dead and at

least 300,000 injured.

No one was spared. The country director’s assistant

died in the earthquake. Two of our drivers lost children.

You’d be hard pressed to find anyone working for WFP

Haiti who hasn’t lost a relative or a friend in the

earthquake. Just like the millions of Haitians who

became homeless overnight, the houses of several WFP

staff were turned to dust by goudou goudou — the

name Haitians gave the earthquake. Yet despite the

trauma and sorrow, everyone showed a sense of duty

that went beyond what was required. The needs of

their families were great, but so were the needs of the

population. Less than 24 hours after the earthquake,

emergency food distributions had already started in

Port-au-Prince and Jacmel.

It soon became clear that a catastrophe of this

magnitude required a massive emergency response.

What no one anticipated was that it would become the

most complex operation in WFP history.

Since then, WFP staff — both in country and globally —

have responded with exceptional speed, commitment

and skill to mitigate the disaster and improve the lives

of those affected. For their effectiveness, WFP

presented Awards of Merit to both the Haiti country

office and to the broader WFP Haiti Team. The joint

nature of the award reflects the strong spirit of

teamwork between field staff and headquarters staff on

this essential mission, which protected the food

security of approximately 4 million food insecure

people. Thanks to the focus, expertise and unwavering

commitment of both groups, WFP was able to help the

government restore access to livelihoods, stabilize food

prices in the aftermath of the emergency and provide

better access to food, increasing its availability in the

crucial months after the 2010 earthquake.

The situation was dire in the wake of the temblor. The

capital city and several other towns were shattered.

Rubble was everywhere, making many roads

impassable. The airport and the port in Port-au-Prince

were disabled. Alternatives had to be figured out to

bring much needed food and relief items to millions of

people who had lost everything. But first things first,

WFP staff needed a place to work because the office in

Port-au-Prince was unusable. Employees set up shop at

MINUSTAH's logistics base. Many actually lived there

too, sleeping under tents erected anywhere they could

find a vacant spot.

Colleagues working for the WFP-led ICT cluster quickly

restored internet and phone services. The Logistics

Cluster, working on behalf of the entire humanitarian

community, became a massive operation. A logistical

hub was set up in the Dominican Republic to facilitate

the flow of goods into Haiti. UNHAS operations were

scaled up and WFP personnel helped coordinate the

reception of cargo at the airport and at the port.

Distribution points were set up in the city to provide

emergency food assistance to 4 million people between

January and April.

When, at the government’s request, general food

distributions stopped in April, everyone in the office

had to start over and help shift the operation toward

longer-term programs. The fact that most were already

exhausted by months of nearly round-the-clock work

did not matter. What was important was to ensure

people in Haiti would not fall into hunger.

The dedication of WFP staff paid off. A study credited

the nutrition program for keeping malnutrition rates

stable in an environment where they easily could have

exploded. There was no food crisis in the country, and

our operations did not adversely affect food prices in

the country. Through the cash and food for work

program, more than 100,000 jobs were created. And

finally, on the logistics side, thousands of tons of food

and relief items were dispatched throughout the

country on behalf of more than 100 organizations.

Then, during the last part of the year, the earthquake

relief operation was further complicated by two new

emergencies: the cholera epidemics and hurricane

Tomas. Once again, colleagues rose to the challenge

and provided assistance to tens of thousands of

Haitians. But perhaps the biggest accomplishment is

that one year later, food is not considered Haiti’s most

pressing problem. The Haitians working for WFP

deserve special praise, as do the international

employees who lived through the earthquake and are

still in Haiti today — as committed as they were before

to improve food security for the most vulnerable.

Haiti Quake: Our Team’sGrace Under Pressure

By Luke Bretscher

When ethnic violence broke out in southern Kyrgyzstan

in June 2010, the WFP sub-office in Osh rushed into

action. Stranded in the city because of a UN travel ban,

WFP’s only Osh employees at the time — Farhod

Haidarov, Asel Omorova and Aibek Saidov (above) —

were trapped at home for the first three days as fighting

raged through the streets. Soon, city water was cut off,

then radio and TV went off the air, and landlines and

internet access dropped. “Our cell phones started ringing

and didn’t stop,” Farhod recalls. “We sat outside the

house all night and could see the fires burning. The next

day, the whole city was covered by cloud of smoke.”

WFP’s warehouse contained nearly 2,400 metric tons of

food, but the Osh team had no way to reach it safely.

Militants had taken control of the streets and set up

barricades blocking the roads. “For the first few days,

they wouldn’t even let ambulances through the

barricades, in case they were carrying attackers,”

Farhod says. “No one trusted anybody.”

Throughout the violence, Aibek, Asel and Farhod

continued to work out of their homes. Asel used her cell

phone to gather information — phoning women’s groups,

WFP partner organizations and city residents to find

ways to reach people in need. Farhod called NGOs in the

area and the International Committee of the Red Cross

(ICRC) to coordinate food distributions. Aibek prepared

to make the perilous journey to and from the local

airport to make sure humanitarians could access the

city. Says Michael Huggins, Kyrgyzstan’s deputy country

director: “When everyone else was fleeing the city,

these three took great personal risks to make sure food

was available.”

Finally, after four long days, with the help of the ICRC,

Farhod was able to reach the warehouse and — thanks

to their timely and careful planning and preparation —

the Osh staff launched daily food distributions within 24

hours.

“Without the efforts of Aibek, Asel, and Farhod, WFP

would have been unable to respond to the immediate

and acute food needs of over 500,000 IDPs and local

conflict-affected residents cut off from supplies due to

violence,” says Robin Lodge, head of the Osh sub-office.

In June 2010, on behalf of the executive director, the

three received certificates of appreciation in recognition

of their selfless dedication in providing assistance at a

time of great need.

They were honoured with an Award of Merit for their

brave and valiant work providing food to the needy in

the midst of turmoil. “The entire office, in both Osh and

(the Kyrgyz capital of) Bishkek, is excited,” Michael says.

“The staff is elated to be nominated. It is a shame they

can’t all go to receive the award.” Asel (below), who

accepted the award, had to fly to Kazakhstan to secure

a seven-day visa from the nearest Italian consulate.

Last summer’s violence behind them, the Osh employees

have turned their eyes to the future. With food prices on

the rise again, they fear summer could ignite further

unrest. “Tension is still there,” Michael says. “There is

heaviness in the air. WFP’s main focus in months ahead

is peace-building initiatives to help calm these tensions

before they flare up again.” To help address the complex

needs, the Osh office has grown from three to more than

20 staff. Although the work is challenging, for Aibek,

Asel and Farhod nothing can compare to the work they

did in June. “This is all routine,” says Farhod now.

“Those early days; that was when we did the real work.”

Providing Food in the Midst of Kyrgyz Turmoil

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“WFP 2010 Haiti Earthquake Response — LessonsLearned” is now available on WFP’s EmergencyPreparedness and Response website, EPweb:http://epweb.wfp.org/ep2/pages/?PageID=105

The report was produced by the EmergencyPreparedness and Response Branch with supportfrom the Haiti country office, the Latin America andthe Caribbean regional bureau, and the PolicyDivision

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For the security team at headquarters, giving back is

a family affair. As security staff tell it, the catalyst

for the orphanage project was a moving email from

Laura, the daughter of Security Supervisor Luigi

Erculei, who had followed her star to Africa three

years ago.

Laura, in turn, was inspired to head to Africa not

only by her dad’s work for WFP, but by the mission

in Malawi of Don Federico Tartaglia, a priest and

brother of Security Guard Valter Tartaglia. In the

summer of 2007, after receiving a university degree,

Laura packed up and moved to Malawi in Don

Federico’s footsteps. A year later, she started a

modest non-profit Lufelade (www.Lufelade.org),

through which she has launched projects to benefit

children in Malawi and Namibia.

“This choice of hers to go to Africa was not easy,”

says Senior Security Assistant Nicola Di Foggia, who

learned of Laura’s avocation from her father, Luigi,

who sits at a neighboring desk. “Here in Rome she

had work, a boyfriend, the good life. She left it all to

follow her conscience, her passion.” Laura’s email

vividly describing her work in Africa and detailing the

shabby and rundown facilities at the Moira Grace

orphanage in Windhoek, Namibia, prompted the

security team’s decision to raise money for the

project. “We have a tradition of collecting money for

family occasions like people getting married or

having a baby, but this was the first time we raised

money together for an external site,” Nicola said.

Each month since June, the 25 staffers at the

security unit get an email from colleague Chiara

Satta, reminding them of their pledge to commit 45

euros minimum to the orphanage. All told in 2010,

the security staff raised 2,745 euros for the

orphanage project — which has now been

completed. In addition, as word spread, they also

received donations from staff beyond the security

office. “The money has been used to paint the

orphanage and playground equipment in bright

colors, as well as to help restructure the bathroom,

laundry room and other facilities,” Chiara says.

“These are all small steps, but they add up to

helping these children have a better life.”

Individual security staff also are involved in

charitable efforts outside WFP. For example,

Francesco “Zac” Zaccaria, Chief of the Security

Branch, raised funds to send dental equipment to a

village in Malawi and runs a campaign of “silent

contributions” for needy, long-term rehabilitation

patients at San Giovanni Battista Hospital in Rome.

Mark Di Lello, from the Security Desk, works with an

association in Ostia to provide free sports activities

for under-privileged youth.

According to Nicola, the “virtuous circle” of giving

back continues to expand through word of mouth. “I

think most people who work at WFP are already

generous, but they don’t like to advertise what they

do on their own,” he says. “Learning about what

other (staff) are doing to help makes you see your

colleagues in a different light. And it makes your

work life better too.”

Security TeamRevitalizes NamibianOrphanage

Field monitor Edgar

Tánchez, a jovial

and calm bear of a

man, is the kind of

colleague you want

by your side when

you travel to

G u a t e m a l a ’ s

remote, insecure

areas. Since he’s

someone of few

words, however,

you might overlook

not only his deep

knowledge about

the people he

covers ― but the compassion that burns for the children

who far too often are neglected, stunted and die before

their time.

Edgar grew up in the El Progreso, an impoverished

region in a country overwhelmed by Latin America’s

highest rates of poverty, social inequality and chronically

malnourished children. Now 59, he has been working

closely with poor communities for almost half his life ―

including 11 years as a field monitor with WFP.

He’s a familiar face in the hardscrabble villages of

Guatemala’s “dry corridor” and the mountain jungle

hamlets ― greeted happily by the children and with

respect by the menfolk. Many of these areas were

devastated during the brutal civil war that ended in

1996. Peacetime brought its own brutality, as drug and

human traffickers prey on the poor amid the neglect of

the government and the world. At the epicenter of

Guatemala’s malnutrition crisis, these are the places that

receive scant attention until they are hit by natural

disasters that range from drought and hurricane, to

volcanic eruptions.

This is Edgar’s world, where malnutrition stunts the

growth of one in two children, a rate that soars to two-

thirds of the kids in the indigenous Mayan areas. The

children grow up languishing in their twilight world of

diminished potential, also due to the lack of education of

their families.

Edgar chronicles the family situations as field monitor so

WFP can tailor the scope and size of programmes to the

needs. Yet when he spots children in critical condition,

and understands the parents feel helpless, he finds he

cannot confine himself to observing and reporting. He

counsels the family on how to do better by their child,

and sometimes resorts to direct intervention.

On a recent day in the drought-plagued community of

Tecuiz, he scooped up two children showing signs of

acute malnutrition and brought them to the nearest

hospital, where three other children had just died of

malnutrition. “This saddens me so much,” he says. ”The

families in this community are very poor and health and

other services are scarce.”

An unbearable irony for Edgar is that all too often, when

the babies and young children start to climb out of the

acute phases of malnutrition ― when their hair loses its

golden-reddish hue and returns to black, when the false

plumpness of tummies due to edema shrinks ― their

mothers pull their children from the hospital and spirit

them home. Just two days before our visit, a mother fled

with her child during visiting hours.

“The mothers think their fair hair and plump tummies

are beautiful, good luck,” a doctor in Jalapa says. “They

get worried when their hair starts to return to its normal

black-brown color, that they are getting sick again.”

Says Edgar: “These children do not die of malnutrition

alone, they die of negligence … they let them go and

never follow up on their well-being”

Three years ago, it was the turn of little Milvian Rowena

Perez de Leon to get a rescue from Edgar. Twice he took

her to a nutritional recovery center ― and twice the

mother brought her home too soon, burdened by the

demands of five other children.

During a visit in November 2009, Edgar was anxious to

check in on Milvian and show visitors “his family,”

suffering amid the latest drought that had shriveled their

corn and bean plants. The WFP rations of corn, beans,

oil and CSB were a lifeline, but were dwindling fast in a

corner of their one-room, dirt-floored house.

Milvian sat in her mother’s lap sucking on a bottle with

a rasping breath. Although her bright eyes followed

Edgar and the other visitors, at 18 months she was too

weak to walk. Her body resembled that of a six-month-

old North American baby. The father explained it took a

13-kilometer walk to the nearest paved road and 150

quetzales to get her to the health center. Work was

scarce and fields were ruined. There was no way to treat

her suspected heart condition.

A few months later, the day of the Haiti earthquake, the

visitor heard of a tiny but no less painful act of

devastation: Milvian had lost the battle to survive.

In Edgar’s world, such losses are borne with sadness

and stoicism. But Edgar, though anguished over the loss

of Milvian, is never resigned. “Living conditions are so

difficult for these families,” he says. “But I am also

convinced that with my work and WFP assistance, I can

contribute to helping them cope with their difficult

situations.”

He is gratified that his own two children, 21-year-old

Christhel and 26-year-old Edgar Jr., have followed in his

big footsteps and are both active in community service.

His daughter Cristhel, a student in the nutrition

programme at university, sometimes travels with Edgar

to the field to provide nutritional counseling to mothers.

“This gives me hope,” he says.

Jennifer Parmelee with Francisco Fion

Edgar’s World:the Twilight ofGuatemala’sHungry Kids

Snapped:Staff in ActionIraq Country Director Edward Kallon (center)

visits the Um Qasr port in southern Iraq to

supervise the country's first food export since 2003.

The Iraqi government donated 4,000mt of wheat

flour for WFP's response to flood victims in

Pakistan. Also pictured (on far left) is Field Security

Officer Reuben Simiyu, along with US soldiers.

WFP/M

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Little Milviansurrounded byher family

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ennifer

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By Mariko Hall

From weathering mortar attacks in Somalia to navigating

the conflict zone in Afghanistan, Mick Eccles' job training

emergency radio operators is anything but boring. But

there’s more than just radios to this bearded aid worker,

whose casual manner and love of roses have won him

friends around the world.

Thanks to his magnificent salt-and-pepper beard, Mick,

54, often stands out in a crowd. “When you look as I do,

with no hair on your head but a face full of it, it does

attract attention,” he says.

Among aid circles, Mick’s beard is the stuff of legend.

But it’s his casual manner, mastery of all things radio,

and passion for growing roses that stick in the mind of

the people who have worked with him.

Mick’s CV is as attention-grabbing as his looks. Before

joining WFP in 2007, he spent six years working

summers in some of the most frigid locales on Earth as

a radio operator and trainer for the Australian Antarctic

Division in support of scientific research.

One of Mike's latest WFP stints was in Afghanistan,

where he ran a “train the trainers” course for radio

operators. In deep field operations like Afghanistan,

where mobile connectivity can be unreliable, radio

communications is the mainstay for humanitarian

workers.

Enter FITTEST (Fast IT and Telecommunications

Emergency and Support Team), which establishes

communications systems where they have been

disrupted by disasters such as wars, earthquakes or

floods. “When we learned that there were as many as

12,000 humanitarian workers in Afghanistan that needed

training, we had to figure out how to reach as many as

possible,” says Mick.

He re-designed the radio course so that his trainees

could in turn train others for maximum impact. The

training included local and international staff, as well as

other UN agencies and NGOs, and targets radio

operators, drivers and guards as the primary radio

users.

Mick says he was nervous about security when he first

arrived in Afghanistan, but soon was immersed in the

challenges of the work, as well as its unique beauty and

culture. “It’s a stunning country. Its mountains and

valleys are beautifully barren in some places, green in

others. And everywhere there are kids playing with

kites. They fill the sky.”

His easy manner has won him friends around the

country, such as the gardener at the WFP guesthouse in

Kabul, with whom Mick discovered a common interest.

“I grow roses in Australia and I used to watch him prune

the roses and other shrubs with a steak knife,” Mick

said. “So I came back from Australia with a pair of

pruning shears and showed him ‘my way’ of pruning a

rose bush.”

It was to no avail ― the gardener was not going to trade

in his steak knife. “So we sat and had tea, with me

pondering how worlds apart we were. And yet, we

shared this love of roses.”

After finishing up in Afghanistan, Mick (pictured above,

far left) moved onto Guinea, where he ran a whirlwind

cross-country course for radio operators, before

returning to FITTEST headquarters in Dubai.

However, Afghanistan has stayed close to his heart, a

fact his two-year-old granddaughter who calls him by

the Dari word for grandpa ― padar kalan ― knows all

too well.

“My family knew what I was doing in Afghanistan and of

course they were worried,“ he said. “But I figured that if

I could help the people there, even in a small way, then

I had to do it. That was my contribution.”

Radio TrainerWires Hot Zonesfor Emergencies

By Peter Smerdon

Hawa Iannello, travel assistant in Rome to Executive

Director Josette Sheeran, recently returned from a visit

to Somalia, the land of her birth, 25 years after she left.

She lost track of her parents when war began in 1991

and re-established contact with them in Mogadishu only

two months ago.

“It’s a miracle story,” says Hawa, 29, on the UNHAS

aircraft returning to Nairobi after two days in Somalia

with the ED and her delegation on a visit to the

northeastern, semi-autonomous region of Puntland and

central Somalia. “The ED arranged for me to go on the

trip. She gave me this chance.”

On the first stop in Somalia, the ED presented Hawa to

the President of Puntland and his cabinet at the end of

official talks in the city of Garowe. Hawa speaks no

Somali but most of the ministers speak English, so when

they learned she was returning for the first time in a

quarter century, they suddenly crowded round her,

smiling and saying, “Welcome home” and “You’re our

sister.”

It was just too much for Hawa, who burst into tears,

leaving hardly a dry eye among the Puntland cabinet

and the WFP delegation. “I felt strongly emotional.

Somalia is my origin,” she says.

Her exact origin is, in fact, Mogadishu, but insecurity

means that Hawa cannot travel there. She’s therefore

planning to get her parents out of the city for a visit to

Europe to meet them at last.

Hawa’s story is complicated. She became sick when she

was four and her father managed to get her to Rome,

where she underwent surgery that required her to

remain in hospital for three-and-a-half years. Her father

stayed with her for 18 months but then had to return to

Somalia.

She was taken in by Italian families and six years later

changed her name to Hawa Iannello Aden Hussein —

Iannello being the surname of her foster parents and Ali

Aden Hussein being her father’s name. But she kept in

touch with her parents by exchanging letters and

photographs through the Somali Embassy in Rome until

the war broke out in 1991 and the embassy closed; after

that, there was no word at all. Hawa grew angry

because she began to believe she had been abandoned

despite her foster parents saying her father saved her

life by bringing her to Rome.

When she was 20, she realized that what her foster

parents said was true. Since then she has never stopped

looking for her parents. In March 2010, Hawa visited

Argentina to find one of the Italian women who had

looked after her in hospital in Rome. The woman

confirmed that her father had had saved her life by

bringing her to Rome, and gave Hawa a photograph of

him.

This year, she contacted a former dean of Mogadishu

University and another person who previously served in

the army. They showed her father’s picture around and

found people in London who remembered him.

Eventually, someone provided a telephone number.

She now calls her father regularly and has discovered

she has three brothers and one sister. They left

Mogadishu between 1990 and 1997 and then returned to

the Somali capital, but her father never stopped

searching for Hawa.

“I love my foster family but I’ve never felt at home

anywhere,” says Hawa. “Thanks to Ms. Sheeran, I had

the opportunity to go back to my country. Hopefully one

day I’ll go to see Mogadishu. Somalia belongs to me, it’s

a part of me, a part of a mosaic that was missing and

now seems complete.”

Tears for Hawa’sReturn to SomaliaAfter 25 Years

Join the more than 1.2 million people whoplay our freerice.comeach month

WFP Twitter Account now has more than125,000 FollowersTwitter, a social network for sharing informationin real time, provides a dynamic way for WFP toreach new supporters. Twitter users can followand be followed by other users, and a "tweet" ―as the short messages are known ― is limited to140 characters.

Typical updates on Twitter include links tobreaking news or interesting stories, photos(through several third-party sites) and shortconversation. WFP's Twitter account posts linksto videos, articles and photos on the mainwfp.org site, and sparks conversation amongfollowers by re-tweeting (posting the tweet ofsomeone else) interesting items.

Recently the number of people who follow WFPon Twitter surpassed the 120,000 mark, animportant threshold for spreading news of ourwork ― and further highlighting the relevance ofWFP’s new communications focus on socialmedia. With the online community fastapproaching 2 billion worldwide ― and users ofFacebook surging well past 500 million (if it werea country, it would be the world's third-largest),social media is quickly becoming an essentialcommunication tool and fundraising opportunity.

If you tweet and want to follow WFP, sign up athttp://twitter.com, and follow @wfp. You can seeWFP's most recent tweets without a Twitteraccount at twitter.com/WFP. Executive DirectorJosette Sheeran is also tweeting directly attwitter.com/josettesheeran, where you can keepup with her day-to-day activities.

WFP/D

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Mick with students in Faizabad, Afghanistan

Now also

in Spanish

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Abeer Etefa, a senior

regional public inform-

ation officer stationed in

Cairo with her family,

filed this report on 1

Feb., in the early days of

the political storms that

spread across the Middle

East, starting with

Tunisia:

It all started last week. I could sense a storm brewing

from the many status updates that popped up on my

Facebook — yes Facebook! — where I read postings

like: “Tomorrow is the day: if we win tomorrow in the

demonstrations, we will meet Tunisia in the finals!”

Still, I didn’t imagine that we would end up where we

are today. Our last official working day at the country

and regional offices was Thursday, 27 Jan., when I was

on a one-day mission to Alexandria. It was a calm day

— in retrospect the silence that precedes the storm. My

Blackberry was acting up, struggling to connect to the

network. The train ride back to Cairo was interesting:

passengers were transformed into political analysts,

circulating rumors — later proven true — that the

internet would shut down, with text messaging and

social media all blocked.

On Friday, the start of the region’s weekend, events

took a grave turn that will mark the history of Egypt.

One of the many headlines of the day was the

communications blackout, a stunning development

unprecedented in the modern history of the internet: a

country of more than 80 million people almost entirely

disconnected from the rest of the world. There was no

internet, no Facebook, no Twitter, no text message, no

mobile phoning. Only landlines, televisions and radios

were functioning. My 15-year-old son turned to me and

said: “No internet — that’s it! I will start my own

demonstration calling for the return of the internet!!” I

suspect he is not really a champion of freedom of

expression, but rather the ‘freedom’ to play online

games on the weekend…

Friday night was the longest and most tumultuous night

that Egypt has seen in decades. As the demonstrations

increasingly spun out of control, the overwhelmed

police seemed to disappear from every neighborhood,

leaving Cairo residents unprotected from the chaos,

with reported looting and gunfire throughout Egypt. A

curfew has done little to stop the upheaval.

I hear shocking news about looting in the Egyptian

National Museum in downtown Cairo — home of the

King Tut treasures and the world’s largest collection of

ancient Egyptian artifacts. Although it seems the most

priceless treasures have survived intact, as an

Egyptian, this hurts so much. Why? Our ancestral

heritage, our history, our pride. These mummies have

been there for 7,000 years.

The next nights left WFP staff members, their families

and the whole country scrambling to confront an

uneasy new feeling that many have never experienced

before: insecurity, with reports of wide-scale looting in

Cairo’s upscale and commercial districts. At the same

time, an amazing thing happened that night that I have

never witnessed in Egypt: community organizing.

Soon our WFP national staff, like millions of Egyptians

around the country, took it upon themselves to protect

their neighborhoods, barricading their streets,

organizing with their neighbors 24-hour neighborhood

watches, and blocking entry to strangers.

Many colleagues from our international staff also

participated in the neighborhood watches with their

baseball bats and sticks to protect their families,

showing solidarity with the local population as we all

share these tense and uncertain moments.

Today is another day. Speculation is circulating around

the neighborhood on how things will develop with the

call for a “march of millions” that media commentators

say could mark a turning point after long days of

popular unrest. I will have to stop here and, like most

other Cairenes, rush out before the next curfew to

queue for my family’s daily baladi bread!

The political upheaval spilled across North Africa and

three weeks later, into Libya. On 24 Feb., one

international staff member — Finance Officer Jeannot

Monyoko Bawa, from DRC, his wife and four children

were evacuated from jam-packed Tripoli Airport along

with 16 other UN staff and dependents. All 23 Libyan

staff were reported safe but isolated in their homes,

while another international staffer, Logistics Officer

Kiir Deng Kiir of Sudan, remained stranded in the

Saharan oasis town of al-Kufra, hub of WFP’s vital

cross-desert food convoys from Libya into Chad.

News accounts described violence and anarchy in the

Libyan capital, with armed soldiers and thugs at

roadblocks throughout the city that reportedly has

also sustained aerial bombardment and widespread

loss of life during the turmoil. "The airport is just a

zoo. There's about 10,000 people there, all trying to

get out," Ewan Black of Britain told the BBC as he got

off a flight at London's Gatwick Airport. "It's just

absolutely manic, basically it's uncontrolled."

In Kufra, Kiir was keeping a low profile after the WFP

office was ransacked and looted by an anti-

government mob smashing computers and stealing

cars. Although an UNHAS aircraft was on standby in

neighboring Chad, Kiir was unable to secure landing

rights for the plane. One week after the other

international UN staffers were evacuated, a relieved

Kiir made it out safely.

The chaos and need soon engulfed Libya and our

emergency operations stepped up. Communications

Analyst Mariko Hall, with Internal Communications’

Jordan Cox, describe how an emergency simulation

became reality in Libya: “This is not a drill.”

For six IT officers, those were the last words of an

emergency simulation in the mythical land of Agrabah —

a simulation that would become very real when the crisis

in Libya exploded nearby.

Around the end of February, the fictional government of

Agrabah — located somewhere between Dubai and the

middle of nowhere, but you might know it best from

Disney’s Aladdin — declared a state of emergency as

massive, unexpected flooding tore through the country.

ReliefWeb flood reports and BBC country profiles were

sent intermittently to a team of IT officers participating

in the simulation, along with their security clearance and

flight information.

The officers — Hugh Macready, Alexander Dulovic and

Rob Buurveld from FITTEST (Fast IT and

Telecommunications Emergency and Support Team),

Abiye Abebe from WFP Dubai, Zaheer Abbas from WFP

Quetta and Mattias Wildeman from standby partner

Ericsson Response — spent the weekend testing,

preparing and assembling the equipment and tools they

needed for their mission.

continued on next page

First Person:from Egypt...

...to Libya

Turmoil Across the Near East

Emergency Simulation Becomes Reality in Libya

Executive Director BriefsPope On Libya CrisisExecutive Director Josette Sheeran during herprivate audience with Pope Benedict XVI todiscuss the emerging humanitarian crisis at theLibya-Tunisia border.

“And yet, when I left, my sense ofrelief was clouded by sadness andworry for my fellow staffers andfriends in Kufra who gathered onthe runway to watch me and waveas I boarded the plane that carriedme to safety” — Kiir Deng Kiir

L to R: Paul Buffard, senior regional programmeadvisor; Abeer Etefa, regional public informationofficer, and Paul Skoczylas, senior policy officer, nearTunisia’s border with Libya, where more than 115,000refugees fled in the wake of the Libyan conflict.

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cont’d... By Monday, they were on the ground. After a

security briefing, they got to work — starting by setting

up something called the WIDER system. Developed by

Ericsson in partnership with WFP, it’s designed to get

fast, reliable internet access to the right people in the

midst of a disaster. “There were a lot of lessons to be

learned from Haiti,” says Gianluca Bruni, the chief of the

IT Emergency Coordination Branch. And now “many

recent advances that have been developed since the

earthquake” were getting their first big field test.

One of the problems experienced in Haiti was that too

many people were accessing the network. To recreate

those same conditions, external staff from World Vision,

the Integrated Regional Information Networks, and the

UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs

were brought in to put some real load on the network

and make sure everything was thoroughly tested.

The desert environment chosen for the simulation could

not have been more appropriate, said Gianluca — and

after the training, the team was immediately put on

stand-by for deployment to Libya. “This is not a drill”

was the last line of the message the team received at

the end of the exercise. Rob Buurveld, a FITTEST

technician who took the two day trip from Cairo to

Benghazi, Libya, described what happened next: “we

deployed this same technology for the first time in a real

emergency situation.”

Just like in the desert, the network would be heavily

used by non-WFP staff: Rob had accompanied an

interagency team from Cairo, and now he had to get

them online in a war zone with no internet access. “The

team needed an internet connection from the start,” he

said. “Because there was no real place for them to go,

they set up an office in a hotel. But of course there is no

internet in Benghazi, so we set up a wireless link

between the hotel and the WFP office.” As for the

difference between a training exercise and the real

thing? “Simulations are based on scenarios… but the real

thing always comes up with surprises — we had to

improvise more.”

Mohamed Saleheen, a longtime WFP employee, is

director of our Japan Liaison Office in Tokyo. He wrote

these thoughts on 12 March, one day after the

country’s devastating earthquake.

Today is a stark contrast to last evening’s hustling and

bustling movement of people and traffic all over this

sprawling city. It’s like the Ferragosto August day in

Rome but with a difference — one can breathe shock

and sadness in the air. The calmness is akin to the

Holy Day of Obligation to commemorate the

Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, yet here the

calmness honours those who have fallen to the wrath

of nature.

This is a shakened city, still reeling from continuous

aftershocks, some of which are greater than the ones

I experienced in Aceh, Indonesia, in 2004. The air is

filled with apprehension, almost ominous of something

more to come; people are wary that some parts of the

city may not have electricity or gas tonight, as the

nuclear reactor supplying power had to be shut down.

The robust looking UNU building, where our office is

located, got badly rattled yesterday afternoon, and a

sudden vertical jolt a little while ago almost pumped

the heart out of the mouth.

The staff are all safe and have finally reached their

destination, one this morning! Last night’s walk with

the calm and composed crowd, and through the

howling cold wind, was like heading to a state funeral.

Despite the traffic jam, not a soul crossed the zebra

crossing until the signal turned green. A few people

who had collapsed along the road were well attended

to, just as those who were waiting in queues to ask

the policemen holding maps the direction of their way

forward. So today is a day of reflection, of praying for

those who have been robbed of their lives and living,

to be together with those who are still near, as well as

silently offer help and support.

Copies of the executive director’s condolence letters

have been sent to the Foreign Ministry. The ED’s

statement has been translated and uploaded in the

local website. The Japan office staff have offered their

unqualif ied assistance which has been well

acknowledged by the Foreign Ministry. Martin Ohlsen’s

offer of stand-by Japanese logistics staff has also been

conveyed. Right now, search and rescue experts are

needed with equipments and technical teams for the

vulnerable nuclear reactors. The prime minister has

indicated that up to 50,000 troops would be deployed

to help, thousands are at the sites already. Just like

committed soldiers without fear, we await the call to

participate in the relief and recovery efforts as soon as

possible.

First Person:Tokyo on the DayAfter the Quake

Mohamed Saleheen, director of the Japan LiaisonOffice (center, kneeling under the letter ’F’), on an18 May visit to the region devastated by thetsunami, is surrounded by volunteers who helpedset up one of the 45 mobile storage units thatWFP has provided along with other logisticalsupport under its Japan Special Operation.Kneeling at far left is logistics officer Kojiro Nakai,on loan from our Darfur operations, who is helpingcoordinate and implement these operations.

The Younger GenerationPrinceton Fellows: From Ivory Tower to the Field Molly Slotznick, an American working in publicinformation in WFP’s regional bureau in Dakar, isone of more than 200 Princeton in Africa Fellowswho have worked in 30 countries and with 40organizations since the program was launched in1999 by Princeton alumni, faculty and staff.

Read Molly’s full story in the Previous Storiesnews section of WFPgo for April 2011

Junior Officers Stretch Wings

Uwe Sonntag is one of 53 current juniorprofessional officers — or JPOs — whose homecountries sponsor their work experience anddirectly contribute their salaries. For Uwe, a 30-year-old German national now based with WFP inKuala Lumpur, the opportunity has been a dreamcome true.

Read Uwe’s full story in the Previous Storiesnews section of WFPgo for March 2011

Nepal Internship Empowers the ExcludedA year ago, Chandani Gurung could never haveimagined the life and opportunities she hastoday, working for the UN in her remote homedistrict of Nepal. She credits an innovative WFPinternship for her success. Chandani not onlycomes from one of the poorest areas of Nepal,but her family are Janajaties, an indigenousgroup that faces social and economic exclusion.

Read Chandani’s full story in Previous Storiesnews section of WFPgo for December 2010.

WFP/C

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Abiye Abebe sets up several generators in “Agrabah”

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You can be forgiven for not stopping everything you’re

doing and rushing to read the Revised Framework of

Accountabil ity for the United Nations Security

Management System. But buried inside that long title is

a big change that affects all UN staff, including everyone

at WFP.

The old system for dealing with security (known as

phases) was abolished as of 1 Jan. 2011, and the new

system, called the Security Level System (or SLS for

short) came into effect.

Below are seven facts on security crucial to every WFP

staffer, especially in the wake of the recent changes —

whether you’re national staff in a country sub-office, an

international professional or a brand-new intern at

headquarters.

1. The new framework is much more than a simple

name change.

Security phase vs. security level — they sound similar in

name, but they’re actually a complete shift in approach.

Here’s an example:

In the past, under the old system, once a geographical

area reached a certain security phase — say, phase 5 —

security measures would come into effect automatically.

They ranged from small restrictions to full-on travel

bans.

Now, with the new levels, this no longer happens.

“There’s no blanket policy anymore, no automatic

procedure of what must be used to mitigate risk,” says

Senior Security Officer Jess Torp in Rome. “We take it on

a case-by-case basis and see what fits best to enable

our programmes.”

2. Security levels are now determined with

informed, objective facts.

“The whole process is de-politicized,” says Jess. “We

make informed choices based on facts and analysis, not

feelings or notions. They’re as objective as they can be.”

They’re also globally comparable. And that’s important,

as the old phase system was criticized for being

“inconsistent from country to country, often because

security phase decisions were blurred by

political pressures or driven by administrative or

financial considerations,” according to the Security Level

System FAQ.

3. You’ll now get more advice when you make a

travel request.

“It’s going to be less of a yes/no process in the future,”

says Jess. Because blanket travel bans will no longer

automatically come into effect based on a security level,

“staff and management need to be more active” when

they check for information available on a travel

destination, he says.

And how do they get that info? “The TRIP system really

helps with this,” says Jess. “It’s not just for managers —

individual staff members need to understand where

they’re going, whether it’s essential to make the trip and

if there are restrictions on what they can do when they

arrive.”

4. Staff and managers need to think hard about

what “essential” means.

“There’s a working group currently defining exactly what

‘essential’ means for WFP’s programs,” says Jess.

Staff need to know why a trip is important and whether

it’s worth it, no matter where they are. “All staff are

accountable to the ED. When it comes to security,

there’s a direct line of accountability from every staffer

to the top level of the organization. This is why

understanding the concept of ‘security starting and

ending with you’ is not just words on paper, but a crucial

element of how we manage risk,” says Jess. For more on

this, see point 23 of the Executive Director’s Circular.

5. “How to Stay, Not When to Leave” is the best

way to remember this.

This key phrase — “how to stay, not when to leave” —

is the best way to describe the new system. Before,

moving up to a higher security phase would trigger all

sorts of responses. “Now, the UN looks at everything —

threat, risk, residual risk — and determines what’s

acceptable in terms of activities for a specific area,” says

Jess.

“Our country directors now have much more direct

influence on the threat assessment and determining risk

in a specific area. Procedures are there to involve them

more — they’re becoming risk managers. They’re more

responsible and accountable, but also more involved in

the process now,” he says. “It’s about putting

management of risk in the right place — with

managers.”

6. It’s OK to ask about the difference between

threat and risk.

The terms can get confusing: threat, risk, security,

safety, residual risk, harm, vulnerability. The FAQ is

there to help: “Threat is the possible cause of harm

while risk is the measure of our vulnerability to the threat.”

Even simpler — that means threat can be anything from

armed conflict or terrorism to civil unrest or

earthquakes. And risk? Risk is measuring how much any

of those aforementioned threats might affect UN

personnel, assets and operations.

7. There are field and HQ awareness courses

designed to help you remember all this.

“We’re running these courses as an add-on to the two

mandatory security training courses that all staff need to

take,” says Jess. “The trainers are more or less

constantly in the field, but during their down-time they

conduct training at HQ too. We’re doing about three to

four a month at HQ now.” Staff can find out when

security courses are happening near them by using the

security training calendar.

7 Security Facts Everyone Should Know in 2011

Football has long reigned as the abiding passion in

Liberia, even throughout the long civil war, and our

country office is not immune. So every Friday at

14:00, in bright sunshine or battling torrential rains,

staff members put aside the cares of work to give in

to the joys and release of playing ball. “As staff

members, we spend more time together at work than

at home,” says Field Monitor Assistant Charles

Korkoyah, “so the importance of sport and recreation

came into play as a way to release stress, and keep

your body fit, as well as getting closer together as one

big WFP family.”

In this spirit, Charles lobbied for support from WFP’s

National Staff Association and peppered co-workers

with emails until, in October 2008, he was able to

launch a WFP sports programme. He was then

baptized as sports coordinator for the staff association.

“Considering the importance of sports in any given

society, I deemed it necessary also for us,” Charles

recounts. “The idea was welcomed by almost all staff

members, national and international.”

“Sport can also bring peace and unity among

individuals, even during conflict situations,” Charles

adds. He recalls witnessing how at one point during

the Liberian civil conflict, even political opponents put

aside differences to jam the sports stadium in

Monrovia “to jointly cheer Liberia to victory” over a

foreign contender in the Africa Cup of Nations

Tournament. ”No hostilities were announced on BBC

news” in its coverage of the event, he says.

The first official sports competition for staff took place

on 24 July 2009, an in-house sports festival including

volleyball, basketball and football. Both international

and national staff joined sides from logistics and the

main office, with a kickoff in football from Taban

Lakonga, deputy country director at the time. The

men’s football team keeps getting stronger ―

participating in tournaments whenever possible ― and

in the meantime, a women's kickball team has also

formed and have started practicing regularly. Charles

says the competitions have a social benefit as well,

providing opportunities for “dancing, better

acquaintance and interactions amongst staff members

of the participating UN, partner and government

agencies.” Most importantly, he says, the introduction

of sports into the workplace “has created a new sense

of unity and helped staff manage stress.”

Liberian Staffers Beat Stress on Football Pitch

Snapped:

Staff in Action

A green mamba snake visits a field office in

Betou, northern Congo. Logistics Assistant

Jean Baptiste Mananga holds up the

unexpected visitor to a hub that assists over

50,000 Congolese who have escaped ethnic

fighting in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

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Liberia Country Office Men’sFirst Football Team (front row,from left): John Saway, JohnClarke, Amos Ballayan, MulbahGolayon, Sam Blayee; (back rowfrom left): Emmanuel Taei,Aaron Sleh, Morris Kamara,Solomon Swen, Francis Dokor,Mambu Trawally.

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Although WFP has been governed for 15 years by an

Executive Board, which meets three times a year at

headquarters, the workings of the entity known

colloquially as “the EB” remain little understood by many

staff. New Secretary to the Board Erika Joergensen —

who recently addressed a staff Open Forum on the

subject — spoke with Internal Communications in an

attempt to demystify the EB (and explain why it’s

relevant to your work).

1. What does the Executive Board do?

I like to call it the ‘engine room’ of WFP. Overall, the EB

provides specific policy direction and supervision of our

activities, and its job is to ensure that WFP is responsive

to the needs and priorities of the countries we help. The

board reviews and approves programmes, projects and

activities submitted by the Executive Director and her

secretariat. It reviews and approves the budgets and

administration of these activities. In addition, the EB

reports back once a year on WFP to the UN Economic

and Social Council, or ECOSOC, and to the FAO Council.

To enable this work, there are frequent consultations

throughout the year and three full sessions, in February

(with, in principle, a focus on organizational issues), in

June (in principle, policy issues), and November (in

principle, financial issues). Operational issues are dealt

with at all sessions.

2. How are EB members selected and to whom do

they report?

The EB as it is structured today — with 36 members —

was established only in 1996. For 20 years before that,

WFP was governed by a 42-member Committee on Food

Aid Policies and Programmes (CFA), and from our birth

in 1961 to 1976, by an Inter-Governmental Committee

(IGC). Because we’re the only UN agency that has “dual

parentage” we are subject to the general authority of

both the UN General Assembly (through ECOSOC) and

the FAO Conference; these two organizations elect our

board members and offer overall policy guidance. Each

EB member has a three-year term and s/he can be re-

elected. Keep in mind that EB members are diplomats

who are not selected as experts in food security nor on

technical qualifications; however, they are well informed

about WFP matters and communicate continuously with

their capitals.

3. Are large donors given greater weight on the

board?

A lot of people think of our EB as our donors; this is a

misconception. The membership of WFP consists of 194

member states of either the UN or FAO. So you must

distinguish between membership and the actually

elected 36 board members. Non board members are

observers. The board itself is run by a five-person Board

Bureau that generally represents five broad geographic

regions and which is voted in at the February board

session. This bureau, which includes a president and a

vice president, meets regularly throughout the year,

ensures there is good communication and sharing of

information among the board members and the

secretariat, and prepares for board sessions.

4. How is the European Community position

conveyed at the board?

The European Commission is the only institutional

observer that sits at the board table and has the right to

speak first alongside board members.

5. How does the EB make decisions?

Through consensus. Votes are rare, and all efforts are

made to get all board members in accord. At the board,

we don’t like surprises, so much of the legwork on

gaining consensus is done before the general EB

sessions — starting from the field … in addition, the

board documents are vital to this process of decision-

making and are ready and circulated a full month before

the EB meets.

6. What happens if there is a deadlock?

The matter will be put to a vote. This is extremely rare:

it only happened once, in 2007, when a decision was

reached on the presidency of the board by a vote of 17

to 16, with 3 abstentions.

7. Does the board meet in secret?

There are very rare occasions when board members

meet among themselves only. In addition, the opening

session for each main board meeting is limited to special

pass holders, for space reasons. Normally, however,

anybody with a WFP badge can attend board sessions,

including consultations that happen throughout the year.

All sessions can also be followed via webcast, and all

Board documents are available on Docustore at;

http://go.wfp.org/web/wfpgo/governance

8. What do you do as secretary to the board?

I am a WFP employee of 10-plus years, having served in

a variety of capacities including country director in

Armenia and Nepal, as well as most recently heading the

WFP Nordic Office. I run the team at the Board

Secretariat, which is comprised of me and 22 colleagues.

We provide all necessary services to the board, facilitate

interaction between the EB and WFP, and organize and

run all three EB sessions, as well as informal

consultations and other meetings. That includes editing,

translating and posting documents into our four board

languages (Arabic, English, French and Spanish). Board

meetings keep us extremely busy and we wind up taking

on anywhere from 100-200 temporary extra staff to

manage them.

9. What are some of the “hot topics” put before

the EB?

Somalia may be a critical issue during the upcoming

board in June, since members will review the Report of

the External Auditor that addresses allegations made

against WFP about its Somalia operations. Another “hot

topic” — given the current difficult economic times — will

be how to determine and prioritize needs at the country

level, and ways to cost-share.

10. What advice would you give to country or

regional offices expecting a visit by board

members?

Board members tell us they don’t want to be put on a

pedestal. They don’t want you to hide the realities and

the challenges of your operations, but to show them in

intelligent and realistic ways. Don’t give them 5-star

hotels and pretty pictures. They want the unvarnished

reality. They want to meet beneficiaries without turning

it into something artificial. Remember: board members

love these visits and get a lot out of them. They can

work to the advantage of WFP and the countries

we help.

by Andy Cole

A new UN interagency report, Moving Towards a Climate

Neutral UN, reveals the scope of WFP’s greenhouse gas

(GHG) footprint ― which makes it the fourth-largest

emitter of greenhouse gases in the UN family behind

DPKO, the World Bank Group and UN Headquarters in

New York.

According to the report, which details 2009 GHG

emissions and efforts to reduce them by 52 UN

organizations, WFP’s emissions increased 6.5 percent

between 2008 and 2009, to 91,608 tonnes of CO2

equivalent. Unlike other UN agencies, where official

travel accounts for an average 50 percent of GHG

emissions (up to 90 percent at some small agencies),

WFP’s emissions are spread nearly evenly between

buildings, vehicles and travel. Our emissions profile is

diverse because of our extensive premises, heavy

reliance on diesel generators in the field, and large

vehicle fleet.

Here are some other interesting facts about WFP’s

carbon footprint:

• The 10 largest country operations in WFP account for

69 percent of total emissions;

• WFP obtains nearly half its electricity from diesel

generators, one of the most greenhouse-gas intensive

forms of power generation. In 2009 our generators

consumed more than 5.3 million litres of fuel;

• WFP’s vehicles reported an estimated 12.3 million

litres of fuel consumption in 2009;

• Official travel included over 20,000 flights totalling

102.1 million km of air travel.

WFP is taking steps worldwide to reduce our carbon

footprint, including: advising country offices on raising

staff awareness and reducing their footprints locally;

generator sizing reviews to avoid fuel wastage and truck

fleet renewal in Sudan; training drivers in fuel-efficient

driving practices and reducing the average age of our

light vehicle fleet; and exploring solar photovoltaic

options in suitable locations, including Chad, Ethiopia

and Niger.

For further reading, Moving Towards a Climate Neutral

UN is available at:

www.greeningtheblue.org/resources/

climate-neutrality, while free materials to engage

staff in “green” activities can be found at:

www.greeningtheblue.org/resources. For more

information on WFP’s GHG footprint, or advice on how

you can make your workplace greener, contact the

Climate Neutral team: wfp.greening@wfp.org

10 Things You MightNot Know About theExecutive Board

Green Corner Green Corner Green Corner Green CornerWFP’s GreenhouseGas Footprint

Jean-Martin Bauer, a regional assessment

officer in Senegal, marks Bike to Work Day on

12 May at the Dakar office. Since he started

riding to work in 2008, Jean-Martin has logged

over 10,000km. "Downtown, I get cheers and

high fives from talibés (local streetchildren).

Dodging the traffic in Dakar is hectic — the

minibuses belch thick clouds of black exhaust

fumes. There are thunderstorms in August and

September, requiring extra effort to beat the

weather — sometimes I lose, and I've been

drenched a few times. Last week there were

gas shortages, and it was nice to be able to get

around without having to worry about fuel."

Snapped:Staff in Action

Cristina Graziani, cargo coordinator in our Pakistan country office and an avid

hiker, was dismayed to see trash piling up along the trail in beautiful Margalla Hills

National Park outside Islamabad. She rounded up 11 colleagues who, armed with

garbage bags and gloves, soon attracted other Pakistani hikers. By day’s end, they’d

filled eight big bags of trash: “On top of helping the environment, we also sent a

good message to other people walking in the mountains,” says Cristina (center,

flanked by WFP hikers Gabriele Dacasto, left, and Hugh Macready, right).

No.1 First Issue No.3 Boutros Ghali

No.14 South Sudan No.17 KosovoNo.9 DPRK

No.37 TsunamiNo.32 Iraq

Highlights of Pipeline’sFirst 50 issuesThe first edition of Pipeline as we know itwas launched in September 1992, replacingan internal newsletter that came out invarious forms since WFP’s birth. Pipeline’sinitial print run was 2,300 copies — which in1992 meant one for each staff member. Itwas standard magazine size, 16 pages,printed on recycled paper and published sixtimes a year. Today, Pipeline is twice the sizeof the early editions, averages 12 pages andcomes out three times a year. For each issuewe print 4,800 copies; approximately 4,000 ofthose go to country offices.

Pipeline’s nearly two decades of existencehave encompassed a lot of history — notablythe seismic shift from two-thirds developmentwork to two-thirds emergency focused work,and recently, the shift from food aid to foodassistance. The past two decades coincidedwith a tripling of natural disasters, and theeruption of our biggest emergency operations:Iraq 2003, the 2004 Asian tsunami, the 2010Haiti earthquake, Sudan, Pakistan, Ethiopia.These forces resulted in a tripling of staff sizeover the decade 2000-2010 — from roughly5,000 to more than 14,000 today.

No.42 Somalia