Zambia, Niger facing Famine - "Catastrophe is imminent" by UN News 12:48pm 24th Jun, 2005   June 28, 2005.    "UN warns of looming food shortage in Zambia". (Reuters)    Lack of funds will soon force the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) in Zambia to slash rations and reduce the number of vulnerable women and children - some orphans - on food aid, the agency warned.    With no new cash donations, the WFP will only be able to feed about 500,000 people, less than half the 1.2 million it believes may need help after the failure of rains devastated the staple maize harvest.    "Without immediate new donations, rations to thousands of people would be slashed in July," said WFP country director David Stevenson.    "Women, malnourished children, the elderly and people affected by HIV/AIDS would be among those to suffer."    Despite Western pledges of aid and support to Africa ahead of the G8 meeting in Scotland in July, the WFP says little has been donated for southern Africa, hurting populations hit by AIDS, bad weather and chronic poverty that leaves many unable to afford food even when it is available.    "The funding shortage is so grave that WFP may need to reduce rations to 61,000 orphans and vulnerable children from July," Mr Stevenson said.    "This will mean an end to their daily meals of porridge and will more than likely be followed by an increase in school drop-outs," he said.    Though Zambia has been widely praised for boosting maize production, drought has hit commercial and small growers alike and many small growers cannot afford pesticides or seeds.    Subsistence farming, heavily reliant on manpower, has also been hurt by HIV.    One in five Zambians is infected with the virus.    "Without donations from the international community, we will have no food for hungry Zambians in July, let alone later in the year when the need is going to dramatically increase," Mr Stevenson said.    23 June 2005 (UN News)    With less than a quarter of the $16 million in requested emergency funds coming in for drought-stricken Niger, one-third of the population, or nearly 4 million people, face a catastrophic famine, according to the United Nations expert on the right to food Jean Ziegler.    The persistent drought and the invasion by many thousands of locusts have destroyed an already fragile agriculture and despite the measures taken by the Government in Niamey, "catastrophe is imminent," he said in a statement issued yesterday.    He noted that the UN had appealed for $16 million for Niger but only $3.8 million had come in so far.    Mr. Ziegler said Niger had a rapid response mechanism in place to help the population but needed funds to replenish it.    22 June 2005    'Spare change' is all that is needed to save hungry children in Niger, Mali.    While developed nations talk of billions of dollars of debt relief for Africa, little more than $7 million is all that is needed to tilt the balance from despair to hope for the most vulnerable victims, mostly children of the current food crisis in two of the world's poorest countries, Niger and Mali, a United Nations agency said today.    "The amount we are seeking to meet the immediate needs of some of the world's poorest people is spare change compared with the cost of many other operations, and yet we find ourselves banging the drum in their name," World Food Programme (WFP) Associate Director for Operations Jamie Wickens said in Dakar, Senegal. "Niger and Mali need help today, not tomorrow."    A lethal combination of locusts and drought has created pockets of severe need in the two countries. But to date, WFP has received only about a third of the $11 million required to fund its emergency operations, leaving a total of $7.2 million ($5.8 million for Mali and $1.4 million for Niger) needed immediately to ensure people make it through the next three months before they harvest again in October.    The most immediate and obvious victims of the current crisis are children, whose frail malnourished bodies have been arriving at feeding centres in disturbing numbers in the worst affected areas, WFP noted.    "At a time when the G8 countries are finally talking seriously about lifting sub-Saharan Africa out of debt and impoverishment, here is a perfect example of how the rich world can make a very practical difference," Mr. Wickens said of next month's summit of industrialized countries in Gleneagles, Scotland. "One of the first rungs on the ladder of development is lifting the poorest of the poor out of hunger."    A nutrition survey in Niger in January suggested as many as 350,000 children under the age of five could be suffering from malnutrition. More recent surveys by the non-governmental organization (NGO) Médecins sans Frontières corroborate these findings and point to a deteriorating situation, typical of a war zone. As many as 800,000 children under five are now thought to be going hungry.    The situation in Mali, which has received even less international attention, is equally stark. Some 1.1 million poor farmers are estimated to be short of food. Recent nutrition surveys undertaken by the NGOs Oxfam-UK and Action Contre la Faim in northern Mali found a significant increase in severe malnutrition among the pastoralist population, particularly young children.    20 June 2005    Millions face hunger in West Africa, urgent aid needed, UN food agency warns.    Millions of farmers and herders in West Africa are threatened with hunger due to last year's drought and locust invasion, severe child malnutrition is reportedly on the rise and immediate aid is needed to prevent the crisis from deteriorating further, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said today.    “The situation is getting worse in the affected areas and unless aid comes now, hundred of thousands of people will be suffering the consequences for years to come,” the chief of FAO's Emergency Operations Service, Fernanda Guerrieri, said of the crisis which is especially acute in Mali, Mauritania and Niger.    “Farmers and herders who have lost their livelihoods because of drought and the locust invasion are living in poverty with very limited access to food,” she added.    Farmers need seeds and agricultural inputs immediately to ensure the October 2005 harvest. Herders depend on animal feed distributions and veterinary services to keep their weakened animals alive. FAO has appealed for $11.4 million for emergency projects in the region. Projects in some countries are already operational but more funds are urgently needed.    According to recent estimates, the sub-Saharan Sahel region as a whole registered a grain surplus of 85,000 tons, but Niger and Chad suffered grain deficits of around 224,000 and 217,000 tons, respectively. An increase in food prices is fuelling the food crisis, especially in Mali, Mauritania and Niger, where millions of people are at risk of food shortages, the agency said.    In Mauritania, FAO emergency projects are bringing assistance to hundreds of thousands of people.    Fortunately, the locust situation is expected to remain relatively calm this summer in West Africa and, contrary to last year, swarms from North-west Africa are not likely to invade the region this year.    Even so intensive survey operations should nevertheless be immediately launched in Mali, Niger and Chad and continue in Mauritania, FAO said in its latest locust update, also issued today.    In the most affected areas in Mali, Mauritania and Niger, access to food staples is increasingly difficult and severe child malnutrition is reported to be on the rise. The scarcity of water and fodder is seriously affecting the health of the cattle, camels, sheep and goats that are the only source of food and income for nomadic communities. Competition for limited resources has sometimes resulted in local conflicts.
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