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WFP "한국 450만불 공여, 취약계층 영양강화에 쓰일 것... 모니터링 상시 진행"While South Korea is soon to make an 8-million dollar donation to the World Food Programme and the UNICEF for humanitairan assistance to North Korea,... the WFP says Seoul's contribution will be used to improve the nutrition of the most vulnerable groups in the North -- infants and pregnant women.He added that the WFP closely and frequently monitors how the food aid is distributed.Oh Jung-hee reports. South Korea's donation of 4-point-5 million U.S. dollars will be used to improve the nutrition of infants, pregnant women and breast-feeding women in North Korea.That's according to Lim Hyoung-joon, the head of the UN World Food Programme's Seoul Office, at a policy debate Thursday organized by Seoul's state-run unification institute.Lim explained... that the WFP runs three major pillars of programs in North Korea -- nutritional support, food for work, and emergency operations -- and of those, nutritional support is the top priority."We have 11 factories in North Korea that produce super cereals and nutrition biscuits. I've brought samples. This is the fortified biscuit we produce in North Korea. And this is super cereal. They have large amounts of nutrients."The WFP frequently monitors food distribution in the North, he says.Around 50 WFP staff -- local and international -- watch over 60 counties, monitoring them up to 150 times a month."In 2017 and 2018, we conducted monitoring more than 2,800 times. We've been doing the monitoring since the mid-90s, and it's improving by the day. In the past, we had to wait for one or two weeks, but now we can do it within 24 hours. We hire Korean-speaking international staff."Out of 8 million dollars that South Korea will be donating for the WFP and UNICEF's humanitarian work in the North,... 4-point-5 million dollars are set to go to the WFP.Seoul's committee in charge of inter-Korean exchanges is currently reviewing the matter,... and the actual delivery of funds to the agencies is expected to happen in early June.Meanwhile, South Korean experts who attended the policy debate agreed on the need for solid mid- and long-term programs to improve North Korea's food security.They say... it's not only natural disasters that take a toll on the regime's food production... but an overall lack of cultivated land, capital and infrastructure... as well as deforestation.Oh Jung-hee, Arirang News.