WFP Regional Bureau for Asia and the Pacific - 2016 SPRs RBB 2016 SPRs by country | Page 854

Standard Project Report 2016
(IFPRI), Timor-Leste scores 40.7, which makes it the fourth of the 52 most hungry countries in the world.
An assessment conducted in February 2016 by WFP, with the Minister of Interior and other government
departments, found that the El Niño exacerbated food insecurity and negatively impacted livelihoods and access to
water in the country, and that this would likely lead to increases in the rates of malnutrition amongst women and
children. The assessment predicted that 400,000 people would be affected, with 120,000 people placed at severe
risk, mostly in the coastal areas of Covalima, Lautem, Viqueque, Baucau and Administrative Region of Oecusse.
The Government responded by providing rice to markets at a subsidised rate, but this did not meet the nutritional
requirements of the most vulnerable groups.
Undernutrition and micronutrient deficiencies among children and women of reproductive age thus remain serious
problems in Timor-Leste, fuelling a poverty trap