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Partners step-up East Africa crisis response – 13 Jul 2011

Around ten million people are suffering as a result of the crisis that is mainly affecting parts of Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia.

UNICEF is warning that two million children are malnourished as a result of the drought in the Horn of Africa, and half a million could soon die or suffer long-lasting mental or physical damage.

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Kenya
The Kenyan government has declared a national disaster in the north of the country, where several years of poor rains have left 3.5 million people vulnerable.

Most people in this area rely on cattle and other livestock to make a living and our partner, Community Christian Services of Mount Kenya East (CCSMKE), is transporting water by tankers to assist them, as well as carrying out new assessments of need to boost their response.

Over the last ten years of operation in northern Kenya, CCSMKE has been helping communities become better able to cope with drought conditions, for example by training people to build dams to store water and teaching them how to combat soil erosion.

The value of this long-term approach to reducing the risk of disasters was underlined by a recent Tearfund report which said that for every €1 invested in these types of activities, communities saw a benefit equivalent to €24.

But the changing climate in East Africa over recent years has had an adverse impact on livestock herders who have seen the value of their animals drop and their markets collapse, resulting in dwindling food purchasing power.

This has come at a time when staple food prices around the world have risen massively, for example the price of white maize at one Kenyan market has risen by 58 per cent in a year.

Conditions for pastoralists are predicted to deteriorate further in the next four months.

Ethiopia
In Ethiopia, where food inflation is running at 40 per cent, 3.2 million people are experiencing serious hardship as a result of the crisis.

Most of them are in the south east, another area where people rely on livestock for their livelihoods.

Other areas in the south of Ethiopia are also showing signs of food shortage-stress. Here partners such as the Wolaitta Kale Heywet Church are preparing to launch a cash-for-work programme that will enable more than 500 families to feed themselves.

Another Ethiopian partner, the Full Gospel Believers’ Church, which is also involved in long term projects to help people overcome hunger, is planning to step up activities such as cash-for-work schemes.

The key to whether the crisis will worsen in Ethiopia is the longevity of rains which need to fall between now and mid-September to avert widespread harvest failures.

In Somalia, our partner World Concern is carrying out detailed assessments of people’s needs this week on the Kenya/Somali border.

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