Thousands in need of food aid, according to assessment

Some 122,000 Rwandan households will need 30,000 mt of food aid during the next three months according to a joint national food security assessment mission, FEWS NET reported.

"Food insecure households will need immediate food assistance through direct food distribution," FEWS NET, a USAID-funded famine early warning system, said.

Such aid, it said, would stop households from eating seed grains, or selling breeding animals. Such measures would further increase Rwandan’s vulnerability to future food-shortage shocks.

It said the assessment by the ministries of agriculture and of local government, as well as by the UN World Food Programme, the Food and Agricultural Organisation, FEWS NET, World Vision and Caritas, found that "most food insecure" provinces were Kigali Rural (mostly in the central Bugesera Region) and Kibuye, in the west.

FEWS NET said current food aid available over the next three months through WFP, Caritas and World Vision was about 17,000 mt. However, it added, this amount was already earmarked through various food-for-work projects, school feeding, HIV/AIDS affected households, "and cannot be automatically shifted to emergency food distribution".

The problem, FEWS NET said, was likely to continue into March and even possibly May, due to late and erratic rains from February to July 2004.

According to the assessment, immediate food or cash aid, and the distribution of seeds to the poorest households, was needed.

The assessment also called on the government to work with donors to obtain "the required food aid through an appeal or through the government's own resources". The assessment recommended that malnutrition rates be "monitored closely" to track the effects of food shortages on the population.