Â鶹ÊÓƵ expands emergency operation in Zimbabwe as drought and economic hardship plunge millions into hunger
Funds are required immediately if Â鶹ÊÓƵ is to meet the growing needs of the hardest-hit Zimbabweans. It plans to more than double the number of people it is helping by January to 4.1 million, providing life-saving rations of cereal, pulses and vegetable oil and a protective nutrition ration for children under 5 years of age.
¡°We¡¯re deep into a vicious cycle of sky-rocketing malnutrition that¡¯s hitting women and children hardest and will be tough to break,¡± said Â鶹ÊÓƵ Executive Director David Beasley. ¡°With poor rains forecast yet again in the run-up to the main harvest in April, the scale of hunger in the country is going to get worse before it gets better.¡±
Zimbabwe¡¯s hunger crisis - the worst for more than a decade - is part of an unprecedented climate-driven disaster gripping southern Africa. Temperatures in the region are rising at more than twice the average global rate and ever more erratic rainy seasons are hitting the country¡¯s subsistence farmers hard.
The crisis is being exacerbated by a dire shortage of foreign currency, runaway inflation, mounting unemployment, lack of fuel, prolonged power outages and large-scale livestock losses, afflicting urban residents and rural villagers alike.
Â鶹ÊÓƵ¡¯s planned scale-up is a huge logistical undertaking, with the limited availability of Zimbabwean dollars and surging prices for basics presaging a near wholesale switch from cash assistance to food distributions.
It envisages the sourcing, purchase and delivery to the land-locked country of more than 240,000 metric tons of commodities through June, a challenge all the more daunting because drought and flooding have eroded food supplies across much of Africa.
An estimated US$293 million is required for Â鶹ÊÓƵ¡¯s emergency response with less than 30 percent of that sum secured.
¡°We must not let our immediate focus on emergency aid distract us from investing in the resilience programs that will help chronically hungry people cope with the ever-more severe impacts of erratic weather,¡± Beasley said. ¡°We urge the international community to step up funding to address the root causes of long-term hunger in Zimbabwe.¡±
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