Aid is scant for Somalia where the next harvest, not due until July, is likely to be below normal because of poor rains.
NAIROBI (AlertNet) – Hunger in Somalia is likely to worsen as “one of the worst droughts in recent memory” intensifies and humanitarian funding is scant, aid agencies said on Friday.
“This drought is so serious, worse than others in recent years, that even the camels in some communities are dying,” said Geno Teofilo of Oxfam Novib, one of the 31 agencies issuing Friday’s statement.
“Some of them (Somalis) are even saying this is the worst drought in 20 years.”
The next harvest, not due until July, is likely to be below normal because of poor rains.
“In the coming months, we foresee the food crisis worsening because it will be some months yet before any benefits from the rains would be helping the Somali people,” Teofilo said.
The fields of Lower Shabelle Region are already littered with the carcasses of dead cattle, while cereals prices soar.
“I have lost everything,” Mohamed Ali, a pastoralist who became destitute after his 250 cattle succumbed to drought, said in the statement.
LONG-TERM AID
Somalia’s humanitarian crisis is one of the world’s worst, with 32 percent of the population, or 2.4 million people, requiring humanitarian aid, according to the United Nations.
With only 36 percent of the $529 million appeal for 2011 funded so far, the agencies, which included CARE and Save the Children, called on donors to increase aid to Somalia.
But donors are wary of funding Somalia because of the long-running conflict there, which dates back to the fall of dictator Said Barre in 1991, and because of concerns aid could be diverted to fund combatants.
Agencies are also unable to deliver food aid to many of the worst affected areas which are controlled by Al Shabaab militia allied to Al Qaeda.
The crises in Libya and Ivory Coast, and the global economic downturn, have impacted funding as well.
However, Teofilo said donors would be wise to take a longer-term approach and provide money for permanent water projects, agricultural support and climate change adaptation to reduce Somalia’s vulnerability to recurrent hunger crises.
“If we could get money for infrastructure and long-term development, these disasters would be mitigated in the future,” he told AlertNet.
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
