The CMA CGM Corporate Foundation has joined forces with the World Food Programme (WFP), the United Nations agency at the forefront in the fight against hunger, to transport aid to the Horn of Africa, which is suffering its worst drought and famine for decades.
As part of the programme set up by the WFP to distribute special highly nutritional products in Somalia, the CMA CGM Group has made available 356 twenty-foot containers – 40 free of charge and 316 at a special rate – which adds up to a total of 10,000 tonnes of food supplies.
The first shipment will leave Zeebrugge on 29 August and should arrive in Mombasa around 29 September from where it will be ferried by the World Food Programme to Somalia.
“We have worked for several years with the CMA CGM Group, whose presence on all the major shipping routes makes them a preferred partner in emergency situations,” explains Dierk Stegen, Head of Oceans on the World Food Programme.
“The CMA CGM Corporate Foundation is particularly sensitive to emergency humanitarian situations. It is why we have mobilised alongside the World Food Programme whose actions are exemplary and fundamental for survival. I hope that our efforts will help save families in East Africa, who are the victims of this terrible famine,” adds Mrs Naïla Saadé, President of the CMA CGM Corporate Foundation.