Dhaka, Bangladesh (BBN)- The Japan government has provided a US$9.1 million grand through the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) for vulnerable people of Bangladesh.

“The WFP on Tuesday welcomed a US $9.1 million contribution from the government of Japan to provide food assistance to the ultra-poor living in areas to floods, riverbank erosion, coastal cyclones and tidal surges,” a Japan embassy press statement said in Dhaka.

The WFP will use the Japanese funds to distribute some 26, 928 metric tons of wheat to 300,000 extreme poor people in the disaster prone highly flood insecure areas including chars/haor basin around three major rivers Jamuna, Padma and Brahmaputra, the statement added.

Charge d’ Affaires of the Embassy of Japan to Bangladesh Yonezo Fukuda said: “This Japanese grant re-confirms our continued support to the Government and the people of Bangladesh. We pledged continuous support to extend our assistance to help people attain better food security and a more sustainable livelihood.”

WFP Representative in Bangladesh John Aylieff said “This Japanese assistance is targeted to the most vulnerable households in disaster prone areas. The grant will enable extremely poor communities to enhance their resilience to shocks by creating human and physical assets and improving life skills and income earning capacity”.  

Japan recently extended a total of US $43.3 million in grant aid to eight countries in Africa and Asia as a relief measure against soaring food prices. Countries are Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Palestine, Uganda, Ethiopia, Sudan, Chad and Lesotho, according to the statement.

BBN/SS/SI/AD-15July09-4:20 am (BST)