Istanbul Haberler

CNN) -- Six UNICEF staffers were headed to Myanmar on Monday after being granted access to enter areas hardest hit by the cyclone in a sign the nation's secretive military junta may be keeping its promise.

The team will assist five local workers in assessing needs in the devastated Irrawaddy Delta. They are expected to remain in the region for a week and map out the heavily-affected areas that have been inaccessible to aid organizations until now.

The decision "is seen as a positive step forward and a kind of openness that the (U.N.) Secretary General has been pushing for in the past few days," UNICEF Emergency Communication Officer Mike Bociurkiw told CNN.

The low-lying delta, known as the country's rice bowl because it produces up to 60 percent of the country's staple crop, bore the brunt of the May 2 storm. The cyclone wiped out crops and flooded the area with salt water, imperiling future harvests. Bodies still lined the shore in some spots, aid workers reported.

About 130,000 people either died or are still missing, according to the United Nations. Myanmar's government has put the death toll at 78,000.

Until now, Myanmar's military leaders have prevented foreign agencies from doing a needs assessment and insisted that any aid be distributed by its soldiers and volunteers. That demand runs counter to the policy of many agencies.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon spent the weekend in Myanmar and guided a conference of 52 donor nations on Sunday. At the meeting, countries pledged in excess of $100 million to help Myanmar recover and said more money would be forthcoming once aid groups are granted access to the worst-affected areas -- a condition the junta agreed to.

The Myanmar government had asked for $11 billion in assistance, saying that the relief phase of the disaster was already over and that money was needed for reconstruction and rehabilitation efforts.

The United Nations estimates only about 40 percent of the affected regions have been reached