Pastoral areas facing food shortages due to poor rainfall

Inadequate rainfall from July to September has brought about food shortages in the southeastern and northwestern pastoral zones, causing an increase in food prices since September and bringing hardship to many households throughout Djibouti, a famine alert agency reported. July rains were below normal throughout the country, but there had been some localised improvements in some areas during August, the USAID-funded Famine Early Warning System Network (FEWS Net) said in its latest update on Djibouti published on Friday. "Future prospects are not promising for the Karan/Karma [rain] dependent areas, which face a long, dry six months before the next rainy season resumes," said the FEWS Net report. "Staple food prices have stabilised at higher-than-average levels following continuous increases since September last year." In the southeastern pastoral zone, failure of the seasonal rains had led to unusual movements of livestock in search of pasture and water, but the situation had improved somewhat where localised rains have occurred. Cash incomes in the zone were relatively low and mainly derived from the sale of firewood and charcoal, FEWS Net said. The report added that households had intensified their reliance on selling charcoal in an effort to compensate for reduced milk production and higher staple food prices. The food-security status of the zone remained precarious. The central pastoral zone had been affected by localised problems of drought prevailing in the north. Camels had been affected by disease in southern Obock. Livestock production conditions in the area, however, were generally closer to the seasonal norm in this zone than they were in other parts of the country. In the northwest pastoral zone, the poor start to the main rainy season was cause for great concern, the report stated. Recent rainfall would bring a temporary break, but food security was likely to deteriorate during the long dry season from November to March. During August, less fortunate families in Djibouti City had found it hard to cope with rising food costs, and although the prices had declined by about two percent this month, they were still higher than average. As a result households were likely to be faced with difficult choices between purchasing sufficient food and cutting back on other essentials, such as school expenses. Consequently, school dropouts could increase significantly this year in more deprived parts of the city. To tackle the problem of high food prices, FEWS Net suggested reducing the cost of staple foods through price subsidies or through a reduction in import taxes on staple foodstuffs. A drop in the cost of essential non-food items, through measures such as providing free stationary and subsidising textbook fees or further reducing the tax on kerosene, could also be considered, the agency noted. An extension of the school-feeding programme to deprived urban areas could also alleviate the problem. Djibouti's arid climate and rocky soil make it difficult to practice agriculture and large-scale livestock management. The tiny Horn of Africa country imports all the rice, wheat flour and sugar, and 90 percent of its fruit and vegetables it needs to feed its 600,000 people. According to its poverty-reduction strategy paper, 42.2 percent of its people lived in extreme poverty in 2002.