WFP helps poor Tajik families

DUSHANBE – The UN World Food Programme (WFP) in January completed a pilot project to give cash to more than 7,000 economically vulnerable residents of the Ayni District in Sughd Oblast, AsiaPlus.tj reported February 4.

"Those families earlier received food aid from the WFP, but this time as part of the pilot project they received ... cash aid of 500 TJS (US $105) per family," a WFP source told AsiaPlus. "Giving families cash allows them to exercise choice and to buy different foods in order to diversify their diet."

"The WFP tries to help families in the winter when income from seasonal work and cash remittances from abroad diminish greatly," said Alzira Ferreira, the WFP Tajikistan country director. The European Commission's Directorate-General for Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection and a leading Tajik bank, Agroinvestbank, co-operated on the pilot project.