Aid worker tells of humanitarian efforts in Syria

Lucia Gobbi helps provide food vouchers to the most vulnerable Syrians

A humanitarian aid worker from Surrey who has been working in Syria for four and a half years says the situation in the country is "hopeful".

Lucia Gobbi, 34, from Walton-on-Thames, works with the United Nations World Food Programme, and has been speaking to the BBC in conjunction with World Humanitarian Day.

It comes a month after the UK government announced an additional £94.5m support package to cover humanitarian aid and support longer-term recovery within Syria during a visit by Foreign Secretary David Lammy.

Ms Gobbi works to deliver either cash or food vouchers to vulnerable families to help with essential food needs.

World Humanitarian Day aims to "honour those who step into crises to help others".

Speaking to BBC Surrey, Ms Gobbi said: "Day to day now the situation is definitely hopeful. If anyone can rebuild it's the Syrians.

"But there's a long way to go, more than half the population is food insecure meaning they don't know where their next meal is coming from."

Ms Gobbi works on programmes that deliver subsidised bread to vulnerable Syrians using wheat flour from Ukraine

In December, rebels led by the Syrian Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham stormed Damascus, where Ms Gobbi is based, toppling the Assad regime which had ruled the country for 54 years.

Since then, Western countries have sought to reset relations with the country.

Foreign Secretary David Lammy became the first UK minister to visit Syria since the country's civil war began 14 years ago

Ms Gobbi said her life in Syria was "relatively normal".

"I go running in the evenings and we visit restaurants in the old city [Damascus], it's a beautiful city and a beautiful country but it's a world away from Walton-on-Thames," she said.

One of the programmes Ms Gobbi works on provides a subsidised bread programme for vulnerable Syrians using wheat flour that comes from Ukraine.

"In terms of humanitarian assistance, it is absolutely coming. It's the investment in infrastructure and real rebuilding of the economy that we're waiting for," she said.

Asked what her future in the country would be, Ms Gobbi said she would be "happy to stay as long as there is a job for her to do".