(AP Photo/str ) Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe, centre, arrives for the budget presentation in Harare, Thursday Dec, 1,2005.
Zimbabwe signs U.N. food aid agreement
Delicious Reddit

DECEMBER 06, 2005
By Happynews Staff, ANGUS SHAW

Zimbabwe signed an agreement Thursday with the United Nations food agency to feed at least 3 million people after previously denying major shortages in the troubled southern African country.
Relations with the World Food Program had been strained since President Robert Mugabe's government told it and other international organizations to stop large-scale feeding programs last year, saying Zimbabwe can feed itself.
The memorandum of understanding was signed after several weeks of discussions, WFP said. It sets out a framework under which food distributions will take place through June, while clarifying government and U.N. responsibilities.
Differences have emerged in the past, with some humanitarian groups accusing the government of withholding food aid from communities that support its political rivals.
"WFP welcomes the signing of this agreement, which will certainly assist in our plans to deliver food aid to hungry people across Zimbabwe," the agency's country director Kevin Fared said in the statement.
Magus blames poor harvests on four years of drought, which prompted the food program to start feeding millions across southern Africa in 2002. But independent economists say chaotic land reform, coupled with government restrictions on the importation and movement of grain, have severely exacerbated the problem in Zimbabwe.
Thousands of white-owned commercial farms have been redistributed to black Zimbabweans in the often violent program that began in 2000, virtually destroying the country's agriculture-based economy.
WFP and its partners distributed food to 2 million Zimbabweans in November and are gearing up to feed more than 1 million more through their programs for the most vulnerable.
Food surveys in June showed at least 3 million people would need aid during the lean months before the next harvests in April. But the government acknowledges the number will likely rise because of "very large" price increases in food since June, WFP said.
The agency is particularly concerned about shortages of the staple maize, warning prices have risen between 500 percent and 700 percent across the country in the past year.
"Many people are experiencing their fourth consecutive year of food shortages and are now surviving on one meal or less a day," the U.N. agency said.