Three Million Need Food Aid in Malawi
JOHANNESBURG - May 17/02 - IRIN -- While the present harvest period had eased Malawi's food crisis, more than three million people are still in need of urgent food aid, humanitarian workers told IRIN on Friday.
In February, the government said that seven million people out of a population of 10 million had no food. Floods, drought and a government decision to sell off its grain reserves - arguing that they were old - contributed to the food crisis.
A senior aid agency official told IRIN on Friday: "There were seven million people in need then, at that time there was a crisis because maize had not been harvested. Now maize has been harvested. But presently the assessment is that about 600,000 households, which should be about 3.1 million people, are currently needing assistance."
He added: "People were eating the unripened green maize [in the early months of 2002] because there was no food. This consumption of green maize will cause a shortage as the months go on. The next planting season is in October, so they need food aid to keep them going in the days and months ahead. The food they have [from this seasons' harvest] may last up to about June, so they need aid to take them through to the next harvest season in April 2003."
He said the shortfall of this years' harvest was estimated to be between 500,000 metric tons (MT) and 600,000 MT.
"The UN system here is to launch a Consolidated Appeal Process which will be tabled at the end of May or early June in Geneva. Malawi needs assistance, about 600,000 households are now at great risk of malnutrition, there's no food, nothing," the official said. The food shortage was also making people more vulnerable to cholera and diarrhea.
Lucius Chikuni, Malawi's Commissioner for Relief and Rehabilitation, told IRIN that an assessment by the government, World Food Programme (WFP) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), confirmed that the total maize shortfall was estimated at 600,000 MT.
WFP is planning an emergency operation to feed 500,000 people a month in June and July. That figure was set to rise to 1 million people in August, and 2 million in September.
The UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) warned in a statement on Thursday that the unfolding food crisis in Southern Africa threatened to become a major humanitarian catastrophe if an immediate and adequate response was not mounted.
"In a region already bearing the full brunt of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, the food crisis presents a new and ominous threat to the survival of the most vulnerable - the children and women," UNICEF's Regional Director for Eastern and Southern Africa, Urban Jonsson, was quoted as saying.
"A rapid assessment of nutritional status undertaken by UNICEF in Malawi last month showed that some 45,000 children are facing severe malnutrition, with the situation likely to worsen in the 2002-2003 lean season."
Reviews of under-five and antenatal clinic records had showed that moderate malnutrition levels had also risen and the trend was likely to continue and could worsen.
"The Malawi assessment shows that the number of children with moderate malnutrition at under-five clinics in the last six months has trebled. The trend is the same with pregnant and lactating women. Even more alarming, the assessment shows that some of the moderately malnourished children are deteriorating to severe malnutrition," the agency said.
UNICEF said it had provided supplementary and therapeutic feeding to children and fortified maize meal to pregnant and breast feeding women at various feeding centers in Malawi.
Chikuni said a national Relief and Rehabilitation task force was working on immediate and long term plans to deal with the current food crisis and avoid a repeat in the future.
Among medium term interventions, a winter cropping initiative that was expected to yield 75,000 MT by October 2002, was already underway. Chikuni said a key intervention would be proper management of strategic grain reserves.
Agriculture and Irrigation Minister Aleke Banda said a consortium of NGOs, donors and the government of Malawi are jointly coordinating the relief efforts to reach as many people as possible through free distribution to the most vulnerable (those who cannot afford to buy) and offers for sale on the markets to those who could buy.
WFP Emergency Officer, Kerren Hedlund said a constant hurdle facing agencies was the lack of an adequate transportation network in Malawi. "The main problem will be logistics. Transport will be a nightmare," she said.
Only 3,126 km of the 16,451 km of highways in Malawi are paved.
Malawi is landlocked and surrounded by Mozambique to the east, and east/west, Zambia to the west and Tanzania to the north. The only direct route to the sea is through the 797 km Nacala railway into Mozambique, which suffered disruptions from recent flooding.
Road transportation through Mozambique and Zimbabwe to South African ports was very expensive and contributed to long delays in food imports into the country.
Malawi's cholera crisis has been aggravated by malnutrition. Cholera has claimed 1,000 lives and peaked in February and March with 40,000 reported cases.
Copyright (c) UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs 2002
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