UK Food Aid: Ethiopia

Lord Browne of Ladyton Excerpts

Wednesday 14th June 2023 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Browne of Ladyton]

To ask His Majesty’s Government, following the decision of the USAid and the UN World Food Programme to suspend food aid to Ethiopia, what steps they are taking to protect the integrity of UK food aid funding paid to the Productive Safety Net Programme run by the government of that country.

[The Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park) (Con)]

My Lords, we are deeply concerned about the recent revelations of food aid diversion in Ethiopia. We welcome the Government of Ethiopia’s joint statement with USAID that commits to addressing the issue and holding those responsible to account. We have asked the World Bank to lead a review of aid diversion risks in the productive safety net programme, which provides 8 million people in the poorest areas of rural Ethiopia with critical assistance.

[Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)]

My Lords, the infliction of starvation by Ethiopia and its allies on the civilian population of Tigray during the two-year war now seems to be continuing in the context of a peace process, a fundamental of which was to ensure unhindered access to aid, especially for women, children and the elderly. A criminal scheme co-ordinated by elements of the country’s federal and regional Governments has been stealing the food aid donated to the UN World Food Programme by the US, Ukraine, Japan and France and diverting it to feed military and ex-combatants and selling it on the open market. Now, because of diversion concerns—and this move is difficult to comprehend—the US Government and the World Food Programme have suspended food aid to Ethiopia and Tigray respectively, pending, as the Minister acknowledged, a USAID countrywide review in co-ordination with—of all people—the Government of Ethiopia. In the meantime, what if any alternative means are being considered by His Majesty’s Government, and recommended to the US Government and the UN, to get life-saving food to malnourished, starving children in Tigray?

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)]

My Lords, we understand why the World Food Programme has taken the decision to temporarily halt food assistance to Ethiopia. It is worth adding that nutritional support and other programmes will continue. The demands placed by USAID and the World Food Programme are reasonable: they want independent investigations that target the people behind the aid diversion schemes, independent rather than government-managed targeting of humanitarian food assistance and independent—again, not government-managed—warehousing and distribution of food assistance. That is what they are demanding, and we understand why. As it happens, we have not yet found any diversion of UK aid, and we hope that does not change with the emergence of new evidence.