UN Agency, World Food Programme wins 2020 Nobel Peace Prize

The United Nations agency, the World Food Programme has been named winner of the 2020 Nobel Peace Prize by the Norwegian Nobel Committee.

“With this year’s Nobel Peace Prize awarded to the World Food Programme, the Norwegian Nobel Committee wishes to turn the eyes of the world towards the millions of people who suffer from or face the threat of hunger.

“The World Food Programme contributes daily to advancing the fraternity of nations referred to in Alfred Nobel’s will. As the UN’s largest specialised agency, the WEP is a modern version of the peace congresses that the Nobel Peace Prize is intended to promote.

“The 2020 Nobel Prize laureate, the World Food Programme, plays a key role in multilateral cooperation on making food security an instrument of peace, and has made a strong contribution towards mobilising UN Member States to combat the use of hunger as a weapon of war and conflict.

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The WFP is winning the honour “for its efforts to combat hunger, for its contribution to bettering conditions for peace in conflict-affected areas and for acting as a driving force in efforts to prevent the use of hunger as a weapon of war and conflict.”

According to Norwegian Nobel Committee, the coronavirus pandemic has contributed to a strong upsurge in the number of victims of hunger in the world. In the face of the pandemic, 2020 Nobel Prize laureate the World Food Programme has demonstrated an impressive ability to intensify its efforts.

WEP is the leading humanitarian organization saving lives and changing lives, delivering food assistance in emergencies and working with communities to improve nutrition and build resilience.

As the international community has committed to end hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition by 2030, one in nine people worldwide still do not have enough to eat and the agency is committed to ending this

The Nobel Peace Prize has been awarded 101 times to 135 Nobel Laureates between 1901 and 2020, 107 individuals and 28 organizations.

Since the International Committee of the Red Cross has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize three times (in 1917, 1944 and 1963), and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize two times (in 1954 and 1981), there are 25 individual organizations which have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Click on the links to get more information.

The Nobel Peace Prize 2019 was won by Abiy Ahmed Ali “for his efforts to achieve peace and international cooperation, and in particular for his decisive initiative to resolve the border conflict with neighbouring Eritrea”