Engineering Hope
World Engineering Day feature
In a world rattled with conflict and the impact of climate change, WFP sets out every day to deliver hope to the hearts of the people and families furthest behind. Today, we recognize the critical role WFP Engineers play in building or rebuilding the infrastructure needed to ensure that not only WFP can deliver it’s life-saving and changing assistance to impacted communities, but also ensuring that the governments and partners we collaborate with on a daily basis can too.
“Our Engineering team across the globe, is full of committed, collaborative and innovative people who truly represent the spirit of WFP. We see a river; they see a bridge. We see a broken-down building; they see a warehouse. WFP is stronger and more capable because we have our Engineers on the ground every day.” Sara Adam, Management Services (WFP Engineering), Director
Who we are and what we do
Our global operations are supported every day by over 200 WFP Engineers on the ground to help communities rebuild their lives in the wake of conflict or disasters. Today, these people are hard at work on design and construction projects in 46 countries.
Here’s what WFP Engineers can build or rehabilitate for any operation:
- Access and logistics infrastructure:
roads, bridges, airstrips, shipping ports, storage facilities, silos and warehouses to support logistics, humanitarian staging areas, camps and food distribution centers. - Community Infrastructure projects:
marketplaces, bakeries, medical clinics, schools and kitchens, wind turbines, solar panel installations, irrigation schemes, culverts. - Safe and Secure WFP Facilities, offices, and accommodations:
construction and maintenance of secured guesthouses and office space in complex environments
Here’s how WFP Engineers helped fortify WFP’s response in four emergencies.
Afghanistan | Engineering Solutions in Shipment Facilities
WFP’s Afghanistan Country Office (AFGCO) is currently upgrading and expanding its facilities across the country in response to the current crisis in Afghanistan. The WFP Engineering team in Afghanistan has ramped up efforts to reach as many people as possible, improving access to food for millions of people — warehouses, storage facilities, offices and accommodations for the humanitarian community.
Spinboldak Transhipment Facility
Kandahar is the center of the Southwestern Region and is located close to the Pakistan border. On one side, Spinboldak in Afghanistan and the other, Chaman in Pakistan. The Pakistani border (Chaman) serves as the main entry point for most goods and food entering the Southwestern Region from the port of Karachi in Pakistan. As per Afghani government regulations, foreign trucks cannot travel in the country and the cargo needs to be transhipped to nationally registered trucks. This is when goods are unloaded from one ship and loaded directly onto another in order to complete a journey to a further destination. The transhipment processes are done at customs office premises, at Spinboldak.
Here’s what that’s got to do with our Engineers. Currently, WFP Engineering in Afghanistan is upgrading the Spinboldak Transhipment Facility operated by the WFP Supply Chain team near the Pakistani border. The work involves security upgrades as well as expansion of the capacity of the facility to receive additional commodities in response to the food shortage crisis.
Thanks to this work, over the last three months, 6649 MT (229 trucks) of commodities have passed through the facility and it is projected that the facility will see the movement of 11,029 MT of food commodities in the first five months of 2022. The upgrade work is intended to expand and facilitate this significant increase in movement of commodities.
Sudan | Rethinking & Rehabilitating Roads.
At WFP, our Engineers wear more than just their safety helmets and vests, they also wear the hats of project managers, visionaries, collaborators & innovators. In Sudan, they are engaged in various activities beyond the traditional engineering portfolio. They’ve got their hands full collaborating and providing insight on sustainable warehouses /storage facilities and infrastructure development for railroads and peace roads.
The extensive internal collaboration our Engineers partake in on special projects with Supply Chain, Programme and WFP Facility teams as well as our engagement with sister agencies like UNHCR for Gedaref Engineering Response, and UN Agencies for common UN Premises (including GH and Health facilities) illuminates their diverse skill sets and commitment to deliver.
In 2021, the Gedaref Emergency Response called on Engineers to pave the pathway to a better and safer tomorrow.
While providing technical support to UNHCR (responsible for camp management), WFP Engineers were focused on eliminating or significantly minimizing the impact of rainy season floods, which could significantly impact the Tigray Refugee Camp operations in Sudan and essentially destabilize two critical roads to the Camps, located at Um Rakouba and Tuneidba of Gedaref State.
Destabilization of the camps and access roads would mean that around 60,000 refugees and the host communities residing in the nearby camps could lose access to life saving humanitarian support. Thanks to this collaboration, the two projects — roads and drainage systems — pictured above were delivered in just a few months’ time and both the camps and the pathways to arrive to them are now safer, more secure and disaster risk ready.
Haiti | Earthquakes, Education & Nurtitious School Feeding
In August 2021, a devastating earthquake hit the southern part of Haiti, killing more than 2,000 people and destroying 1,200 schools, roads and bridges. Thousands of schoolchildren were left facing food insecurity and with over 345,000 children depending on the World Food Programme (WFP) for daily school meals — our Engineers stepped in.
In October 2021, WFP Emergency Roving Engineering team supported our Haiti operation to establish a team focusing on school and community infrastructure reconstruction and rehabilitation projects in three earthquake affected areas of Haiti (Grande Anse, Nippes and Sud).
In the just three months, four new schools were rehabilitated in record time despite massive challenges and insecurity resulting from gang violence and the fuel crisis, that hindered access and progress to the construction site.
The newly rebuilt schools are all earthquake and cyclone resistant, and the modules include a classroom, kitchen and storage space and can be expanded to include additional classrooms.
LIBYA | A rehabilitated Market Center and much more
In a community that has been marred with conflict which created social discord and led to the collapse of agricultural systems, WFP Engineers in Libya delivered hope for a better, more peaceful future in the newly rehabilitated Market Centre in Ubari.
After several months of construction, the marketplace opened on 21 September 2021. Capacity holds approximately 150 vendors and it is estimated over 35,000 people will come to access the shops and enjoy the green space area every month.
The market is crucial because it will accommodate many farmers and sellers in one place to sell their products/crops more easily and to enhance their incomes. Many different cultures and communities can meet and work together and increase social cohesion.
We hope you walk away from this story with a greater understanding of how WFP and the humanitarian communities work, every day, is empowered and fortified by our Engineering teams on the ground.
Learn more about WFP’s Engineering Services
This article was written thanks to the collaboration of WFP Engineers and Communication Focal points on the ground.
