Luxembourg Pledges Additional €500k Support to Address Niger Food Insecurity Crisis

On Tuesday 4 July 2023, Luxembourg hosted its fifteenth Partnership Commission with Niger, a priority partner country for Luxembourg's development cooperation programme for more than 30 years.

The Partnership Commission, co-chaired by Franz Fayot, Luxembourg's Minister for Development Cooperation and Humanitarian Affairs, and Hassoumi Massaoudou, Niger's Minister of State and Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation, resulted in the signing of an amendment to the memorandum of understanding (MoU) relating to support for the food crisis prevention and management mechanism (Dispositif de prévention et de gestion des crises alimentaires - DNPGCA) in Niger. This amendment will see Luxembourg contribute an additional €500,000 (within the framework of the fourth Indicative Cooperation Programme (ICP IV)), intended to support Niger in its response to the food and nutrition crisis of 2023. This additional contribution brings Luxembourg's support to the DNPGCA to a total of €6.5 million for the years 2022 to 2026.

This annual meeting between Luxembourg and Niger was also an opportunity for the ministers to take a closer look at the progress of the ICP IV programmes and to discuss the main strategic lines of development cooperation between the two countries.

Discussions also focused on the political and security situation as well as food and nutritional security in Niger. In this context, Minister Fayot highlighted the humanitarian-development-peace nexus, a key element of ICP IV, and stressed the need for stronger coordination between the various security, humanitarian and stabilisation actors in order to be able to respond to the multifaceted crises affecting the country.