Annual Country Report 2020: Islamic Republic of Iran. Country Strategic Plan 2018-2022

Rome (Italy): World Food Programme, 2020.

English

35 p.

ELR1883

2020 has been a unique and challenging year for WFP Iran, with heightened risks but also many learnings and new ways of delivering assistance to the most vulnerable. Against this backdrop, WFP managed to reach about 30,300 refugees who live in 20 settlements across the country with cash and food, 3,000 refugee girl students with education incentives in the form of monthly cash transfer, 8,000 schoolchildren and their 500 teachers with healthy school snacks and more than 460 women and men in 12 settlements with livelihoods opportunities to help boost their self-reliance. In addition to this, WFP provided emergency food assistance to around 18,000 flood-affected persons in April in Sistan and Balochestan province and 62,000 persons affected by floods and COVID-19 in five other provinces. Overall and despite all the challenges, WFP managed to reach 112,448 beneficiaries this year, marking a 22 percent increase compared to 2019. To mitigate the negative effects of the food price hike and loss of income due to COVID-19, WFP doubled its cash ration from April onwards and added lentils - as an important source of protein - to its food basket of oil and wheat flour. Wherever settlements had to be quarantined and movement restricted due to the COVID-19 outbreak, WFP distributed ad-hoc cash top-ups to ensure refugees had continued purchasing power and access to food in settlement shops. Though schools were largely closed due to the pandemic, online learning sessions were conducted through smart phones and TV channels. The school feeding activity commenced as a new initiative in April. Boys and girls at primary and secondary schools and their teachers received school snacks as home rations instead. WFP continued to promote gender equality and education support by providing monthly cash transfers to girls at primary and junior high schools. Further efforts were made to empower women by prioritizing them for livelihoods opportunities and providing cash incentive for those households headed by men who introduced their women as bank cardholders for cash distribution.

Electronic ed.

ELR 1883

eng

MON-127784