James Morris, the executive director of the World Food Programme (WFP) who also met Mugabe in Durban, said the ZANU PF strongman had finally agreed to allow private companies to participate in the importation of relief food into Zimbabwe.
The Zimbabwe government had only allowed the state’s Grain Marketing Board to import and distribute food aid required to feed six million people or half the population.
Morris said Zimbabwe had a two million metric shortfall of grain but there was a positive response from Western governments such as the United Kingdom, the United States and Canada, international charitable organisations and Japan.
The WFP had calculated that a third of Zimbabwe’s food requirements would be mobilised internally while the rest would be imports.
The Zimbabwe delegation, in another apparent show of its softening, joined the rest of Southern Africa Development Community partners on Monday here to reluctantly endorse NEPAD, a programme that has been heavily assailed by its media and influential leaders such as Information Minister Jonathan Moyo.
The Zimbabwe government had only allowed the state’s Grain Marketing Board to import and distribute food aid required to feed six million people or half the population.
Morris said Zimbabwe had a two million metric shortfall of grain but there was a positive response from Western governments such as the United Kingdom, the United States and Canada, international charitable organisations and Japan.
The WFP had calculated that a third of Zimbabwe’s food requirements would be mobilised internally while the rest would be imports.
The Zimbabwe delegation, in another apparent show of its softening, joined the rest of Southern Africa Development Community partners on Monday here to reluctantly endorse NEPAD, a programme that has been heavily assailed by its media and influential leaders such as Information Minister Jonathan Moyo.