Severe food and water crisis in Gedo

Virtually all pastureland has disappeared and most water sources have dried up in Somalia's southern region of Gedo, increasing the likelihood of malnutrition and disease, said an official of a famine early warning agency on Wednesday, following a visit to the area. "The only coping mechanisms left are migration; reducing the number and quantity of meals; collection and selling firewood by the poor; and food aid," said Sidow Ibrahim Addou of the USAID-funded Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET). Addou had participated in a food security assessment in Gedo at the end of March. Addou said 60 percent to 70 percent of the cattle in Gedo had died during the past two months; 40 percent to 50 percent of sheep and goats and 30 percent to 40 percent of donkeys had also perished. Between 5 percent and 10 percent of the camel population had died, and the surviving ones were severely weakened and emaciated. Families were encouraging stronger members to seek employment, and their problems had been exacerbated by very high cereals prices and extremely low market prices for livestock. The little water available was contaminated, exposing an already weakened population to many water-borne diseases. Preliminary findings of a nutrition survey carried out by an inter-agency team led by Food Security Analysis Unit-Nutrition (FSAU) had shown a global acute malnutrition rate of 23.8 percent and severe acute malnutrition rate of 3.7 percent, indicating a critical nutrition situation in the area, which borders Kenya to the west and Ethiopia to the north and has been described as the epicentre of the drought. Gedo has a population of 375,280, according to United Nations World Health Organization figures for 2004. The assessment revealed a crude mortality rate of 1.04 percent per 10,000 persons per day, and an under-five mortality rate of 2.46 percent per 10,000 persons per day. "If the gu (April-June) rains are below normal again, Gedo will face a famine," Addou said. "Even if the rains come, the people will require support at least until the next harvest in August." Humanitarian agency CARE provides food aid for most of those in need in southern Somalia, including Gedo. The United Nations World Food Programme fed some 55,200 people in the districts of Garbaharey and Buurdhubo in southern Gedo in March, according to the agency's spokesman, Peter Smerdon. An estimated 1.7 million people in northern, central and southern Somalia are facing an acute food and livelihood crisis or humanitarian emergency because of prevailing drought. Preliminary estimates said that number would rise to 1.8 million - including 800,000 highly vulnerable children - over the coming months. Other regions likely to be at highest risk include Middle Juba, Lower Juba, Bay and Bakol. Last month, aid agencies launched a revised appeal for US $326.7 million to avert a humanitarian disaster in Somalia. Christian Balslev-Olesen, United Nations Acting Humanitarian Coordinator for Somalia, told reporters in New York on Tuesday that the humanitarian crisis in that country must be addressed immediately not only because of the severity of the situation but also due to recent progress on the political front. "It's not business as usual. Somalia is facing a drought, an emergency situation - the most severe in a decade - and this is coming on top of a situation where you already have all the most difficult indicators for human development," he said, adding that drought-induced hardship put recent political progress in danger. A fledgling government is struggling to establish itself in Somalia, which has had no functional administration since the toppling in 1991 of the regime of Mohammad Siyad Barre. "The two elements - the political peace process and the humanitarian situation - of course do present two different momentums. But they are interlinked," said Balslev-Olesen.