Zimbabwe will receive $32 million, or more than half of an expected $60 million insurance payout to African countries facing drought due to the El Niño effect, Zimbabwean Finance Minister Mthuli Ncube said, as quoted by the media.
"Zimbabwe will get $32 million from insurance payouts in a few weeks’ time," he noted.
The minister added that the government has identified areas where it will distribute them in the form of cash payments as well as food.
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said last week that about 7.6 million of Zimbabwe's 15 million people needed "life-saving and life-sustaining" humanitarian assistance after the country's worst drought in four decades and launched a $430 million appeal to help those most in need.
Last month, Zimbabwe's government declared a national disaster due to drought caused by the El Niño climate phenomenon, and President Emmerson Mnangagwa said that the country needs $2 billion in aid to feed millions of hungry people.
The government has laid out food security initiatives to combat hunger, and an important element of the plan is the expansion of food distribution programs.
On Thursday, a delegation from the Grain Millers Association of Zimbabwe traveled to Brazil to negotiate the purchase of 400,000 metric tons of yellow and white maize to avert a hunger crisis in Zimbabwe.
In southern Africa, Zimbabwe became the third country after Malawi and Zambia to declare drought a national disaster, a measure that is said to allow for more resources to address the crisis.