Historic drought in Horn of Africa threatens ‘large-scale loss of life’
BISLE (SOMALI REGION), 12 July 2011 (IRIN) – Every day, 500g of boiled wheat is divided up between two adults, four children, a calf, a goat and a donkey in the Farah household. It is the only food they have had after rains failed for the past two seasons.
The 15kg sack of wheat is provided to about 1,200 people in the Bisle area, which has four settlements, under the government-run Productive Safety Net Programme (PSNP) as payment for work, such as digging water holes. “It is boiled wheat for breakfast and for the main meal – we don’t have anything else – no milk, no meat, no vegetables, no oil,” says Maria Farah, the mother. Not surprisingly, two of her children are severely malnourished. The calf and goat that share their “ari” – a collapsible egg-shaped hut made of sticks and covered with sheeting – are emaciated. It is too hot for them outside, in temperatures that soar beyond 40 degrees Celsius. There is no water in their settlement, about 54km north of Dire Dawa town in the Somali region, one of the worst hit by drought in Ethiopia. More than a million people have been affected. […] For Farah’s family in Bisle, the worsening drought continues to threaten their livelihood. Their donkey, tied to a post, used to help carry water from the nearest waterhole about four hours. But he is frail. “He is too sick to move now,” Farah said. These pastoralists have lost scores of animals in the past three months. “What will you do – you are just taking notes, are you going to help us?” asks Ali Abdi, a 60-year-old pastoralist. This is the worst drought he has seen in his lifetime, he adds. An unrelenting battle with failed rains over eight years has left them with no sense of a future nor any hope of a better life. […] The settlement is among the most accessible in the harsh Somali region during the dry season. “So NGOs drop by with some food now and then and there is a health post,” said Abdullai, explaining their choice to make their home in Bisle, which has only become drier. Maria Guled, a mother of five, the eldest 11, lies awake at night worrying about them. “I don’t have any other family anywhere else to send them to.” Her children are unable to go to school because “they are too hungry”. […]
ETHIOPIA: Somalis living from drought to drought 
NAIROBI, 11 July 2011 (IRIN) – Civil society groups are rallying together to help the vulnerable as the drought ravaging Somalia spreads to hitherto unaffected areas, amid concerns that hunger-related deaths are dramatically increasing. “We are knocking on every door to collect help; nothing is too small,” Asha Sha’ur Ugas, a member of a civil society drought committee, told IRIN. “Many people have already died and many more will die if help does not arrive soon – and by soon I mean right now.” She said they were already getting reports of people who died on the way and “ones who died after they reached Mogadishu [the capital]”, adding, “most of the deaths were children and very weak adults, such as the elderly, pregnant and lactating mothers”. […] “We have not seen anything like this in decades; in the past, we had droughts but those affected only some regions, this is affecting more regions than ever before.” She added that the current drought was worse than that of 1992, better known as “Caga Barar” (swollen feet), because of its scope. “Caga Barar was mainly confined to the Bay and Bakol areas [southern Somalia],” she said. “This one has much greater reach.” […] Ibrahim Isak Yarrow, the acting Minister of Interior of Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government and a member of a ministerial drought committee, said the situation was extremely bad and “will probably get worse”. Noting that more and more people displaced by the drought were coming to Mogadishu, Yarrow said: “Our estimates are [that] in the last few days, between 5,500 and 6,000 families [33,000 and 36,000 people] have arrived.” He said the number of new arrivals was expected to reach 10,000 families [60,000 people] by month-end. The government has appealed for assistance. “We are working on an appeal document right now.” A local journalist in the north of Mogadishu told IRIN most of the earlier drought-displaced were from southern Somalia, “but we are seeing a new influx from the central regions”. Many of the new arrivals were in a terrible state. “Every family seems to have lost a loved on the trek to the city or immediately upon arrival.” He said the drought-displaced was settling in abandoned buildings across the city while others were building temporary shelters in open fields. […]
SOMALIA: Rising death toll feared as drought spreads 
NAIROBI, 4 July 2011 (IRIN) – A severe drought ravaging the arid and semi-arid parts of the Horn of Africa region is threatening the livelihoods of pastoral communities, with massive livestock deaths recorded amid an increase in deadly conflict over resources. Pastoralists depend on livestock for all their basic needs and any losses undermine their economic and food security. Livestock sales are often used to buy grain and lack of milk and meat contribute to high malnutrition levels. “The value of livestock – people’s main assets in many of the worst affected areas – has plummeted and livestock markets have collapsed, so people have much less purchasing power than before. People’s livelihoods have already been decimated, but there is now also a real risk of large-scale loss of life,” warns Oxfam in a 1 July statement, adding that in some parts of Kenya and Ethiopia, at least 60 percent of the herds have perished. […] In the 2008-2009 Kenyan droughts, truckloads of dead and dying heads of livestock were common. […] FSNAU estimates that at least 2.85 million people are facing food insecurity in Somalia, a 19 percent increase from January. In Kenya, the food-insecure population is estimated at 3.5 million. Large livestock migration from northeastern Kenya and Somalia’s arid areas of southern Gedo to Juba and Bay regions in southern Somalia may lead to early depletion of pasture and water in these regions, according to FSNAU. […]
