(Yonhap)
South Korea decided Tuesday to provide $4 million in humanitarian aid to 14 countries suffering from food crises due to desert locusts, the foreign ministry said.
The assistance will be provided to Yemen, Pakistan, Ethiopia, Kenya and other Southwest Asian and African countries via the World Food Programme (WFP) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), according to the ministry.
In East Africa alone, more than 25 million people are estimated to be in a food crisis. Of the total, 11 million are deemed to be under the direct influence of the locusts, which are fast spreading amid climate change favorable to their proliferation.
The aid will be spent on providing food to those countries, as well as on activities to prevent the further spread of the desert locusts, the ministry said.
"As a responsible member of the international community, the government will actively take part in its efforts to help countries and people suffering from various humanitarian crises, not just from natural disasters," the ministry said in a release.
In March, South Korea provided $200,000 in aid to Pakistan to help the country fight the spread of the locusts. (Yonhap)