Reduce the food aid for Syrian refugees in Jordan increases hours of fasting

Reduce the food aid for Syrian refugees in Jordan increases hours of fastingimage

29 Jun 2015

The shortage in the value of food vouchers to the Syrian refugees in Jordan from the World Food Program (WFP), resulted to the impoverishment of the tables of refugees in Ramadan, as some families breakfast was limited to a few vegetables and canned food, which not feed hungry mouths.

Complaints Syrian families in the city of Ramtha, northern Jordan, focused on the impact of the gradual reduction that has occurred on the value of the coupons, and that caused the inability to provide basic needs, without finding an alternative compensate them, especially those committed to them by local laws, which prevent work without government authorization from the ministry concerned.

Syrians accredited mainly to World Food Program aid, some family members have the breakfast after Azan more than an hour until his family can provide any available of food through the “charity banquets” which includes Ramadan tents where philanthropists donate food to the poor.

Rajah Mohamed Ahmed, 34 years old, from the western Damascus, lives with his wife and four children in an apartment no more than two rooms, says, “My home rent 150 dinars (about $ 211), I cannot pay it because I do not work, how I will give breakfast for my children.”

Rajah said, “This third month of Ramadan fasting in Jordan, and unfortunately the situation is getting worse day by day I sell half Coupon food we get, to pay a fraction of the rent on the house, and the remaining amount is not enough to buy food.”

Jonathan Campbell, regional adviser and coordinator of the emergency food program of the United Nations, Jordan, in previous statements of Anatolia said that “the World Food Programme was forced earlier of this year, and as a result of lack of funding, to reduce the value of the coupons provided to Syrian refugees in local communities, from what it is planned to have value of 20 Jordanian dinars ($ 28.25) to 13 Jordanian dinars ($ 18.4) per person per month, and we will have to reduce the value of the less of it too so to become 15 Jordanian dinars ($ 21.45), and 10 Jordanian dinars ($ 14). “

According to official statistics, there are in Jordan 1,388,000 Syrians, 750 thousands of them entered Jordan before the start of the revolution, by descent, intermarriage and trading, and the rest are registered as refugees.

Jordan’s northern border with its neighbour Syria is more than 375 km, punctuated by dozens of illegal outlets, which was and still crossings for Syrian refugees, destined for Jordan as a result of the war taking place in their country.