Recent rains in Horn of Africa too late to relieve drought misery: UN agencies

Although spring rains have been falling in East Africa in recent weeks, they come too late to end the hunger crisis that threatens some 8 million people, United Nations agencies active in the parched region said today.

“Even normal rains won’t bring dead livestock back to life in the north or provide an immediate harvest in the east. There is no quick fix to this emergency after five consecutive poor seasons,” Tesema Negash, Kenya Country Director for the UN World Food Programme, said of the crisis that also effects people in Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia and Somalia.

“Ironically, these rains bring little respite,” he added, saying that flooding in some areas has even made it harder to get food aid out, and there is increased risk of people falling sick from drinking contaminated water, and weak livestock dying when temperatures drop at night.

Those people who have lost everything will need food and other assistance well into 2007 and beyond, Mr. Negash said, as nomadic herders have lost all their livestock and subsistence farmers have no money left for seeds or fertilizer.

In Somalia, the representative of the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), Christian Balslev-Olesen, said that current heavy rains are just “a drop in the bucket” compared to the amount that has been needed for a long time.

“We are very much afraid of what is going to happen in the coming months,” Mr. Balsleve-Olesen said. “There will be no food, no way of surviving a normal life in Somalia.

“That means children are totally dependent on the kind of assistance that we can provide: food, water health and nutrition,” he added, noting that children are among the worst-affected by drought, as they weaken quickly from dehydration and malnutrition.

There are at least 1.6 million children under the age of five in dire need of life-saving assistance in the Horn of Africa, UNICEF said.

In a related story, Angélique Kidjo,

UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador and three-time Grammy nominated singer from Benin, is scheduled to visit UNICEF and Oxfam projects in Kenya from 24 to 27 April to draw attention to the plight of the people of the drought-stricken region.

Ms. Kidjo will visit food distribution, water and health facilities and meet with elders from southern Somalia about the challenges facing that country, particularly around issues of viable pastoral practices and food security.