On the ground with the UN… | Catalyst Kōrero - 26th June

Starvation, conflict, earthquakes, floods, epidemics: Alastair Cook has seen – and worked in – them all.

His 23-year career with United Nations was a long way from his Gibbston childhood, taking him from Kenya to Somalia, Pakistan to Malawi, Myanmar to Afghanistan, Gaza to Syria.

While the UN sometimes gets a bad rap, especially from some politicians, Alastair says its people do an amazing job wherever the need is greatest, be it humanitarian, peacekeeping, emergency preparedness, refugees, disaster response or food delivery.

For instance, during the South Sudan conflict, the UN World Food Programme he worked with delivered 4000 tonnes of food a day, a truck leaving every five minutes, to 8.6 million displaced people.

The UN’s biggest agency, WFP’s headcount is nearly 20,000, the spend around NZ$22 billion a year. At any one time, about 10% of the freight in sub-Saharan Africa is WFP food. As at the beginning of this year, they were delivering food to around 135 million people around the world.

What of the future, with funding cuts, political attacks on its work and some governments refusing or limiting their access? “The world is in such a state of flux, nobody can say.” But what he does know is that people need to understand the amazing work the UN is doing on the ground, every day. And that the need is not going away.

Thursday, June 26, 6 to 7:30 pm, at The Rees Hotel Queenstown. Registration required to ensure your seat. Please donate online or bring cash for your koha, which will be given to KiwiHarvest.