Update: Warm Nepali Meal for Adversely Affected people due to Indian Border Blockage

Kamala Upreti, General Secretary and Renu Sharma, President of The Women’s Foundation Nepal, have recently been in Europe conferring with our funders and securing new partnerships for our WFN programs. After 26 days of our visit to Switzerland and Germany, Kamala and the president of WFN arrived home to Nepal on the 2nd of December.

The situation of Nepal is getting worst day by day. Nepal is a landlocked country and over 60% of all our supplies and products come through from India. Following political protest by the Madhesi people of southern Nepal, India set up blockades preventing trucks from coming through their border: medical supplies, food, petrol, cooking fuel, everything. After three months of this, the situation for poor and displaced people in Nepal, already so badly affected by the earthquakes of the spring, has become even more desperate.

We have opened a life saving kitchen in the compound of Women’s Foundation Production Center. We could see clearly how very difficult the situation of thousands and thousands of people had become during the time we were away because of a blockade of supplies coming over the border from India. People are now starving.

Many single mothers, especially poor, non-skilled labourers and their families are in big difficulties. Because of the blockade from India, there is no fuel or products to continue work in shops or construction. Poor labourers cannot find any work. They are penniless and have no food, no gas to cook, no oil, they cannot even find fire wood. Everywhere there are long lasting power cuts and petrol is rationed. Businesses are shutting down and Nepal’s economy is being shattered. Yesterday several women came to our organization with their children. They shared their painful stories and there were many tears. They said that they had not had any food since three or four days. After hearing these stories, our team went out into our local community to see for themselves the situation of people and how widespread the emergency is.

We found many poor people who are now starving. Several children could no longer go to school because they have no food to eat. It was very hard to see. It made our hearts hurt. So when we got back to WFN offices, we decided to call a meeting right away. We all shared what we saw in the various areas we had gone to. It was very hard to share such sad situations but out of this we decided to start the life saving kitchen to provide food for poor people beginning the very next day.

So far, we have distributed food to over 675 families today. Over 625 people have already registered their name to come to eat in the kitchen but seeing today’s mass we expect it to be double. They need to come to us since they have no fuel to cook with as well as no food. We are going to cook rice, mix vegetables, and dal for these people.
Please spread the word. If you find any other kind hearts who are willing to support, it will be a blessing !!!
‪#‎We_honor_generosity‬!!!