The World Food Programme (WFP) announced on Sunday in a statement released in Algiers that delivered over 1,000 tons of barley to Sahrawi refugees living near Tindouf (southwestern Algeria).
"This is the second time that WFP buys barley since its inception in 1963 and is the largest quantity purchased" since then, explained the WFP representative in Algeria, Richard Dalrymple.
This cereal, used in the traditional diet of Western Sahara, "costs much less than wheat flour and WFP can deliver a quantity more important at a time when prices of basic foodstuffs are high," said the head of WFP.
In addition to barley, WFP delivered rice, he said.
WFP delivered 125,000 rations of food per month to Sahrawi refugees and 10,000 food rations to more children suffering from malnutrition, pregnant women and lactating mothers and 27,000 rations to primary schoolchildren, "Dalrymple recalled.
The WFP began providing aid to Sahrawi refugees in 1986 at the request of the Algerian government.
More than 165,000 Sahrawis live in refugee camps.
Morocco, which was annexed in 1975 this former Spanish colony, is proposing a broad autonomy of Western Sahara under its sovereignty.
The Polisario Front, supported by Algeria, rejected the Moroccan proposal and calls for the independence of the territory through a referendum on self-determination.
