USAID Will Continue Deliveries Of Food Aid Throughout Ethiopia Following Corruption Scandal

The United States Agency for International Development will recommence food assistance delivery throughout Ethiopia in December, five months after it paused its statewide program amid a huge corruption scheme by local authorities.

Last month, USAID restarted food assistance to the nearly 1 million refugees in the east African nation after the Ethiopian government decided to separate itself from the delivery, storage and distribution of refugee food supplies.

The expected restart comes after the agency implemented improvements to strengthen the registration of recipients and the monitoring of donated grain, USAID spokeswoman Jessica Jennings said Tuesday.

She said that these new measures “will fundamentally shift Ethiopia’s food aid system and help ensure aid reaches those experiencing acute food insecurity.” The new measures will be evaluated for a year.

USAID and the U.N.’s World Food Program halted food assistance to Ethiopia’s Tigray area in mid-March after finding a huge conspiracy by government officials to steal donated grain. When the two organizations learned that the theft was occurring throughout the nation, they decided to suspend their programs nationally in early June.

USAID officials say it might be the largest-ever theft of food assistance. The organization has already attempted to prevent Ethiopian government officials from having any participation in assistance programs to combat corruption.

Due to violence and famine, 20.1 million Ethiopians are impacted by the suspension and need on food assistance. Thousands, if not hundreds, of impoverished people in Tigray have starved to death as a result of the stoppage, according to reports from the Associated Press. A ceasefire a year ago ended a two-year battle in the northern region of Ethiopia.

If Ethiopian authorities are still engaged in the food distribution, the U.S. assistance organization did not disclose. “The government of Ethiopia has agreed to operational changes in their work with humanitarian partners that will strengthen our partners’ ability to identify and approve beneficiaries based on vulnerability criteria,” said Jennings.

The WFP also initiated relief to refugees in Ethiopia in October but has yet to begin food supplies statewide.