* Any views expressed in this opinion piece are those of the author and not of Thomson Reuters Foundation.
By Haoua Lankoandé, Advocacy Manager, MMD Project, CARE Niger
Niamey, Niger - For those of us in the city, we are seeing the first signs of food crisis spreading across our country. We have seen it before. It has already started, and it is coming fast.
The first phase is when young men and women start leaving the villages, coming to the big towns, looking for work. ‘Knock, knock’: they come to your door and say ‘do you have any work?’ You ask them, what can you do? And they reply: ‘Anything. I can do anything.’
In the second phase, they come to the door, ‘knock, knock’: ‘Do you have any food? I haven’t eaten in three days.’
In the third phase, they don’t ask anymore. You wake up and go out side in the morning, and there is a family sleeping on your doorstep. They don’t ask for anything, they just look up at you, hoping. If you give them something, they say thank you. If you don’t give them anything, they are quiet. They just put their heads down, slowly get up and move to the next house.
It takes just a couple of months to go from phase one to phase three. We are already in phase one. It’s amazing how quickly it happens.
We need to act now: provide cash-for work so people can buy food, provide school feeding programs so children stay in school, support resiliance efforts like community gardens and cereal banks. Because once they start showing up in the cities, it means they are already coming to the end of their resources. They have sold their assets. They have no food. This is happening now.
CARE did an assessment in one of the villages, and already we are seeing that there aren’t many young men and women left – they are leaving for the cities and towns, hoping to find work. And here in Niamey, people are already starting to show up at our doors. ‘Knock, knock’.
