Syria's interim government is calling on international donors to help stave off a food crisis in the country where drought and the civil war have caused a dramatic drop in wheat production this year.
Abrahim Miro, finance minister of the interim government, said in Istanbul on Thursday that the pending food crisis was caused by low wheat production and the fact that much of the crop is produced in areas held by the Islamic State group and the Syrian government of President Bashar Assad.
Miro said a grain agency set up by the interim government managed to procure some wheat, but is several hundred thousand tons short of what is needed to provide bread to 2.5 million Syrians living in Aleppo, Idlib, Daraa and Quneitra provinces.
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