Hunger & Hardship in the Horn

courtesy of BBC online

The Eastern Africa region, like the Sahel, is experiencing what has been described as the "most severe food crisis in the world today", with at least 10 million people affected in Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia and Uganda, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). 

Somalia is one of the hardest-hit countries in the region, with deaths being reported in some areas amid alarming malnutrition levels. 

"We are no longer on the verge of a humanitarian disaster; we are in the middle of it now. It is happening and no one is helping," according to Isaq Ahmed, the chairman of the Mubarak Relief and Development Organization (MURDO), a local NGO working in the Lower Shabelle region of Somalia. 

He said: "In the three districts of Qoryoley, Kurtunwarey and Sablale [in Lower Shabelle] our estimate is that some 5,000 families [30,000 people] have been seriously affected by the current drought." 

Ahmed said those who can are moving towards Mogadishu in hope of survival. 

"Those remaining in the area are the ones who cannot even afford transport to Mogadishu," he said, adding that a number of people had died due to a combination of hunger and related diseases. “Most of those who died were children, the elderly, and lactating and pregnant mothers," he said. 

Up to eight people a day were being buried in Lower Shabelle, according to Sultan Sayidali Hassanow Aliyow Ibirow, a senior traditional elder in Lower Shabelle. Most of them were cattle herders who had lost everything. 

"Three years of little or no rain have led to this disaster. People have not recovered from their previous losses and now we have an even worse drought," he said. 

Driest season since 1950 

In many pastoral zones, this is the driest season on record since 1950. Drought conditions in Somalia have had regional implications, with refugees flowing into Kenya, Ethiopia and Djibouti. The irony is that these three countries in particular are also suffering from drought and food shortages and struggling to keep their own populations free from hunger.

According to Save the Children, children arriving from Somalia in the Dadaab refugee camp in northern Kenya are exhausted, malnourished and severely dehydrated. 

"Nearly every child or parent we have spoken to says they are not just fleeing fighting in Somalia - the drought and food crisis are equally perilous to them now,” said Catherine Fitzgibbon, Save the Children's Kenya programme director. 

Experts are warning that the situation could get worse in the short term if the delayed and poor rains cause the current crop to fail. 

In Ethiopia, the estimated number of people in need of emergency food and non-food assistance was revised upwards from 2.8 million to 3.2 million. Nearly two thirds of the requirements were in the southern Somali and Oromia regions as well as in the Southern Nations, Nationalities and People’s Region, where shortages of water and food were recorded. And if drought were not bad enough, cereal prices have continued to rise, with inflation rates close to 30 percent recorded in April. 

According to the Food Security and Nutrition Working Group, a regional forum, the rate of Somali refugees arriving in southern Ethiopia has jumped from 5,000 per month to more than 30,000 in the second week of June. Among new arrivals to the two camps in the Dolo Ado area, the Global Acute Malnutrition (GAM) rate is 45 percent, way beyond the 15 percent emergency threshold set by the World Health Organization. 

In Djibouti, poor rains from March to May of this year hurt pastoral household food security and sent food prices shooting up. The average price of wheat flour increased by 17 percent between January and February 2011, to US$620 per ton, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization’s Global Information and Early Warning System, GIEWS. 

Rising Prices and Falling Currency in Kenya 

In Kenya, rising inflation rates have also adversely affected poor households’ ability to buy food. Prices of the main staple, maize, have tripled from about 1,300 shillings (US$14.4) in January to 4,500 ($50) for a 90kg bag. 

Recently, the government announced the removal of tax on imported maize in a bid to cushion consumers. But millers say rising global maize prices mean the measure will have little impact on the commodity's prices locally. (Noor Guhad stands in the middle of the dry Oda earth dam, where water would have reached over his head three years ago. Now he has to dig deep to find water. Photo courtesy of www.ifrc.org) 

"The problem has been compounded by the fact that the Kenyan shilling has been on a free-fall, trading at an all-time low [about 90 shillings to the US dollar] not experienced in the country for almost two decades. I do not see the cost of maize dropping any time soon," said one local miller. 

The recent March to May “long rains” in Kenya were poor for the second or third successive season in most rangelands and cropping lowlands, with many of these areas receiving 10-50 percent of normal rains, noted the Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWSNET). 

The consequences include declining water and pasture, and subsequent livestock deaths. In the predominantly pastoralist north, a low milk supply has contributed to malnutrition levels soaring above 35 percent. The GAM rate in northwestern Turkana has hit 37.4 percent, the highest ever in the district. 

Nationally, at least 3.2 million people are currently food insecure - up from a projection of 2.4 and 1.6 million in April and January, respectively. 

Even in Kenya’s coastal region, thousands are food insecure, says the Kenya Red Cross Society’s (KRCS) region manager, Gerald Bombe, who oversees a Drought Response operation run jointly with the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.

/PC

thanks to our good friends at IRIN or the original version of this post.

Happy birthday dear tragedy

We in the aid business are getting very good at marking the anniversaries of massive tragedies. Heck, we even win awards for it. Tsunamis, cyclones, earthquakes - you can rely on the aid agencies to bring out any number of glossy publications and e-products to mark the first month, second month, third month, six months, nine months, one year, two years… five.. ten.. even 25 (yes, the Chernobyl disaster happened 24 years ago, look out for the reports next year).

Our commemorations generally have an “x months (or years) after the storm/quake/eruption/outbreak/flood life is slowly getting back to normal for villagers in etc and so on”. When it isn’t. Or when “normal” means abject poverty. (photo credit to 12 year old Zhao Lei who entered the photo as part of a Red Cross competition to document life 2 years after the Sichuan quake in China, You can read her story about the photo here and view more entries from this youth photo project here).

Why do we do it? What impact does it have? Of course we have to show the sunny side, otherwise it means we have failed, that years after a disaster people are still living without shelter, clean water, food security, education, infrastructure - much like they were before the disaster, in fact.

We also do it in solidarity but even there I’ve something of a bad taste in my mouth. With the technology we have we ought to be able to let the affected communities plan the commemoration themselves, and tell it like it is, for them. If they want to, of course.

But how critical are we of what we did, of how we spent the money? The media is, finally, nipping at our heels like Jack Russels (maybe we need Rottweilers?), sometimes completely missing the point of course, but at the same time waking us up, copping us on.

And how critical are we of each other? Of the communities themselves and the governments who have the first duty to react and care?

Look at the disasters we responded to in the 80s, or the 90s. How much has changed for the pastoralists of Ethiopia, the children of Somalia? How have we failed to improve living conditions in sub-Saharan Africa? In rural Asia? In the remoter parts of the ex-USSR (where life expectancy is falling - actually it’s falling all over, even in the cities due to poor health, alcohol and drug abuse, violence).

What could be done better?

A release on the wonderful Alernet Expresso tells me: “Aid workers have expressed concern that recovery work in cyclone-affected Myanmar may be hampered by the disbandment of a coordinating group set up to oversee aid efforts.”

There’s the problem for you. All we can really do is express concern, because outrage, shock, disgust, despair, vitriol, sorrow, scorn, spleen and so on and so forth would have us out of the country as quick as you can say “the road to Mandalay”.

I’ve had issues (and pints) with John O’Shea from GOAL at times but I watched him with relish on an Al Jazeera report when he was venting about access to Haiti. 

He was advocating one single leader (actually Obama, a non-starter and he knows it) to go in and take charge. While he was in full flight the anchor wailed “bu..but..what about political sensitivities?” O’Shea barely suppressed a mischievous grin and gave a bitchslap of an answer. “I’m sorry, I’m only a rank  and file  journalist and aid worker. I don’t understand words like political sensitivities when two million people need help.”

Granted, being unaware of sensitivities is a recipe for disaster, but you can be sure O’Shea is well aware of them, despite his protests.

So what to do? Fight the good fight, keep up the work, but ask questions all the time. Use the aid to get the access to ask the questions. Use the access to get the aid in, ask the questions. Keep asking the questions, like Bob Geldof did. “Why hasn’t that man got any food” he repeatedly asked an official in Ethiopia, back in the day. And while it’s a cute trick, it’s still a good strategy.

Don’t put up with bad standards, don’t accept “we can’t do any more”, don’t accept it when our team is working a turnkey operation. Get out there and change things. That’s why we’re doing this job.

Isn’t it? 


/JL

New ocean forming in African desert

Earlier this year I read a fascinating book by the author Amos Nur called Apocalypse which argued that earthquakes and natural phenomenon have had far more influence on the shaping (or misshaping) of civilization than hitherto given credit, even more than war and politics.

Then today I learn that geologists have confirmed that the African continent is being torn in two, forming a new ocean. An international collaboration has shown that a 35 mile long rift in the Afar region of the Ethiopian desert, which opened in 2005, is likely to be the beginning of a new sea.

The recent study, published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters (well worth signing up for their emailed updates which provide short snippets of the latest initiatives and breakthroughs in scientific research) brings together seismic data from the formation of the rift, showing that it is driven by similar processes to those at the bottom of oceans.

African and Arabian tectonic plates meet in the desert, and have been slowly pulling apart for roughly 30 million years. The same movement has also been parting the Red Sea. But this is only at a speed of less than 1 inch per year.

The sudden cracking in 2005, referred to by geologists as a "mega-dike intrusion", opened up a rift over 20 feet wide in places. The study has found that this happened over only a few days. According to Cindy Ebinger, a co-author of the study from the University of Rochester: "We know that seafloor ridges are created by a similar intrusion of magma into a rift, but we never knew that a huge length of the ridge could break open at once like this." (Credit for photo accompanying this post also goes to the University of Rochester).

The investigation was led by Professor Atalay Ayele of Addis Ababa University in Ethiopia. As well as Rochester, other groups involved included Eritrea Institute of Technology; National Yemen Seismological Observatory Center; University of Leeds, United Kingdom; Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris, France; and Columbia University, New York.

"The whole point of this study is to learn whether what is happening in Ethiopia is like what is happening at the bottom of the ocean where it's almost impossible for us to go," said Ebinger. "Because of the unprecedented cross-border collaboration behind this research, we now know that the answer is yes, it is analogous."

One to watch and follow for sure and while Nur's thesis, mentioned above, may not be water-tight accurate it is certainly compelling. A corollory of his analysis however can be proven from this interesting research and that is that despite the serious political difficulties between countries - such as Eritrea and Ethiopia - the search for truth through science and understanding knows no borders and has the power to unite even the bitterest of enemies.

/PC

Minority Plights

Countries on the front line in the "war on terror" are using the battle against extremists as a smokescreen to crack down on minority groups, according to an international human rights group. While this may come as little surprise to some seasoned observers it is rare enough to find a report that methodically documents the evidence and puts a convincing case forward.

For the fourth straight year, Somalia, Iraq, Sudan and Afghanistan topped an annual index compiled by Minority Rights Group International (MRG) of countries where minorities are most at risk of genocide, mass killings or violent repression.

"You see governments who have faced a genuine threat, but the point is the actions they have taken against the wider civilian population, including minority civilians, has been justified as part of the 'war on terror,'" according to MRG director Mark Lattimer.

"It has included disappearances, torture and extrajudicial executions." A two-year insurgency in Somalia led by al Shabaab militants, who have links to al Qaeda and include foreign Islamists among their ranks, has killed some 18,000 civilians.

The insurgency has put historically oppressed minority groups such as the Bantu, Gabooye and Yibir at particular risk, the chairman of Somali Minority Rights and Aid Forum, Mohamed Hassan Daryeel, said.

"If the Yibir go with the government, they will be attacked by the radical Islamists. At the same time, if they go with the Islamists, they will be considered terrorists, and if they are neutral they'll be targeted by all sides."

Daryeel said recent amputations carried out by al Shabaab fighters were performed on child soldiers forcibly recruited from minority groups. "They are at the bottom of society, the most disadvantaged," he said.

Despite a decline in violence in Iraq, the report said civilian deaths from violence were still estimated at 300-800 a month over the past year. It said minorities continued to bear the brunt of the violence, especially in the Nineveh area, home to the Shabak people.

"The Shabak community has suffered a lot at the hands of the terrorist groups and at the hands of the Kurdish 'Assayish' (secret police)," says head of Iraq's Minorities Council, Hunain Al-Qaddo. He said around 10,000 Shabak families had fled parts of Mosul to their homeland in the Nineveh plains for fear of being killed because of their ethnicity.

The rest of the top 10 list was comprised of Myanmar in fifth place, followed by Pakistan, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Nigeria and Israel/Palestinian territories.

Pakistan rose on the list due to an escalating conflict against different Islamist groups, combined with growing violence in national politics and suppression of dissidents.

Ethiopia, Eritrea and Yemen were assessed as under greater danger than a year ago with their governments' involvement in regional conflicts compounding the risk of repression at home.

African states make up half the report's top 20 list.

Source: Alertnet

Go here to access the full report: Peoples Under Threat 2009

/PC

Praying for Rain

The Ethiopian government and its humanitarian partners in the country say nearly 5 million people require emergency food-aid this year, outside the governments own safety net programme. An additional 1.2 million mothers and children under five there will require supplementary feeding. We are now working with the Ethiopian Red Cross Society to finalize plans for the major food-aid operation it hopes to start next month in Oromiya and Somali regions.

Praying for Rain - the story of Ute-Muda Garero

Ute-Muda Garero has 12 children by his two wives, Makayi-Jiro and Abayo-Sorsa. Six boys and six girls. Tidy numbers.

“Are you a Muslim,” asks a visiting Ethiopian expert in animal husbandry.

“No, and not a Christian either. I believe in one god,” says Garero, 38, smiling with the deliberately ironic reference to monotheism.

“Do you pray?” says the expert, intrigued by Garero’s equanimity.

“Yes, and I pray for rain.”

It is would be burdensome enough raising 12 children in Dhuko – one of the Ethiopian Red Cross Society’s three critically drought-affected “peasant associations” hereabouts. The name is a Marxist legacy, meaning just a settled community in a woreda (district).

But adding to his worries is the knowledge that his herd of cattle have deteriorated to the exact mid-point of the official yardstick of animal health : between two and three on a four-point scale (another tidy number), four meaning near death.

Garero is the one of the few herdsmen who have stayed in Dhuko to sit out the dry season, fearful of getting mixed up in the tribal conflict over water and pasture he says bedevils the part of nearby Borena zone where hundreds of other men from the PA have temporarily migrated, seeking better grazing.

Only the women and children and a handful of community leaders and elders are left.



Ute-Muda Garero knows all about cattle-rustling. He’s one of the few pastoralist herdsmen who have stayed behind in Dhuko village, Oromiya, to sit out the dry season, fearful of getting mixed up in a conflict over water and pasture he says bedevils an area where hundreds of other men from the village have temporarily migrated, seeking better grazing. But his animals are suffering for it. They have already deteriorated to the exact mid-point of the official yardstick of animal health: between two and three on a four-point scale, four meaning near death.

“I pray for rain”

“My cattle will be ‘threes’ even if the rains start on time,” he explains, referring to the main seasonal rains due next month. “If the rains fail, they’ll die for sure.”

“What would you do then?”

“There’s not much we can do. We’ll have to depend on relatives. And aid.”

From a lack of resources, the Ethiopian government was recently forced to put Dhuko on half-time in its “safety net” of food-aid and cash handouts, which nevertheless includes some 6 million people across Ethiopia.

The ERCS is hoping to help fill the gap with food-aid distributions now being planned in Addis Ababa and locally.

For two years there has been no proper seasonal rain here – just the occasional torrential downpour that damages homes and crops and ploughs up the barely-passable 60-kilometre track to the nearest town, Hare Kello.

A little way short of Dhuko, an elderly Norwegian missionary and local legend, Jorunn Hamre, 77, apologizes for the small size of her congregation at the Mekane Yesus church, depleted by the same curse that has drastically thinned Dhuko’s population: drought.

“Things are really difficult here,” she says. “Food-aid is very necessary.”

It’s in Dhuko and countless thousands of settlements like it that the disaster in the Horn of Africa is hidden: difficult to see, even standing in the middle of it. But it’s there.

Children who look half their age from malnutrition; unnecessarily high infant-mortality statistics; “resource wars” fought between different tribes who might otherwise live in peace; the gradual erosion of an ancient lifestyle – pastoralism; in some places, like the centre of Ethiopia’s vast Somali region, the potential death of hope.

For the moment, the gods – be they one or many – seem to be against the pastoralists of Dhuko.

this story first appeared on ifrc.org and was written by Alex Wynter reporting from the Goro Dola, Oromiya region, Ethiopia.

/PC

Famine stalks Ethiopia yet again

Here is a compelling report from the field by a Red Cross writer, Alex Wynter. It portrays the enormous challenges facing the people in Negele, southern Oromiya, Ethiopia, as they struggle to feed their families and maintain their livlihoods.

In 'the business' of humanitarian aid, this is categorized as "a slow onset disaster" -- this type of scenario is notoriously difficult to promote in the media and to raise funds for. It seems, sadly, we still live in a world where it takes tv images of emaciated, starving children before we 'react'. To prevent such disasters is logically and financially much more sensible but it is rare.

What is unique also about the current drought in Ethiopia and throughout the rest of the horn of Africa is that it is provoked almost exclusively by external factors such as climate, rising fuel and food prices and the sudden devaluation of the dollar. This is well outlined in an assessment report produced by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies last December.

See more reports from the field by Alex Wynter on www.ifrc.org/foodcrisis.


/PC