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Many aid workers believe donor response to crisis alerts depends on media coverage, but it may not be the only factor
By George Fominyen
Have you heard about the looming food crisis in West Africa’s Sahel region? Aid agencies certainly hope so, and are stepping up their communication drive this week to spread the word about this impending disaster that could hit millions of people.
There have been press conferences, news releases and social media alerts (on Twitter and Facebook) about the issue on an almost daily basis.
On Monday, Oxfam warned journalists in Dakar that, if nothing is done now, up to 9 million people are at risk of food shortages in this semi-arid area that runs south of the Sahara desert.
Low water levels from patchy rainfall, poor harvests, a lack of pasture, high food prices and a fall in overseas remittances are combining to cause serious problems in Mauritania, Niger, Burkina Faso, Mali and Chad, Oxfam officials said.
On Tuesday, the U.N. World Food Programme (WFP) issued a statement from its Niger office warning that food prices are rising uncommonly for this period of the year. They usually fall between October and December, which is the harvest season in the Sahel.
“Unusually high food prices are affecting needy people who are facing growing difficulties as they struggle to feed themselves and their children,” Denise Brown, WFP country director for Niger, said in the statement.
“I am deeply worried about the food situation deteriorating in the coming months, and we cannot sit back and wait for the worst to come,” she added.
WFP aims to provide food assistance to some 3.3 million people over the coming year in Niger alone, with a budget of $163 million.
On Thursday, a regional working group on food security and nutrition, made of up U.N. agencies and international NGOs, will launch a strategy document in Dakar on how to respond to the Sahel situation.
But will these multiple cries for help be heard?
TOO LITTLE, TOO LATE
When I speak to aid officials, they tell me they hope international donors will react promptly if there is sustained media interest in a potential emergency.
Using rather tactful language, they chide the media for not picking up their crisis alerts. They believe journalists and editors prefer to react only when things have gone sour, and there are emaciated kids to catch on camera.
Some in the media retort that they do not know where to draw the line between aid agencies peddling exaggerated doom and gloom about impending crises and accurate warnings. They prefer to see for themselves, and that often only happens once conditions have become severe.
This time in Dakar - where a large number of U.N. agencies, international NGOs, pan-African and international news agencies have their regional offices for West Africa - I have seen many reporters and TV crews attending press briefings on the looming hunger crisis.
That begs the question of whether this media attention will be enough to get donors to grasp the need for large-scale early action and funding.
Rob Bailey, a fellow at London-based think tank Chatham House, says donors have a history of failing to respond in a timely fashion, and so aid agencies have a lot of explaining to do directly with wealthy governments to ensure they act now.
“They must demonstrate how early interventions will save more lives and lower the cost of the response, and they must provide no-regret and least-regret options that donors can fund, knowing they will bring benefits no matter how the crisis unfolds,” Bailey said.
It seems that, even if you have already heard the buzz about worsening hunger in West Africa, there’s no guarantee the right things will be done fast enough to head off a crisis.
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