Inputs could improve harvest prospects

Drought-prone northern Namibia, still battling with food shortages as a result of 2005's poor harvest, will receive agricultural inputs from the Red Cross this year. In a bid to boost agricultural recovery, the Red Cross will provide 12,000 households in the northern Caprivi and Kavango regions with maize, millet seeds and fertiliser, said the organisation's national programme manager Abel Augustinio. According to a recent food security and vulnerability assessment conducted jointly by the Namibia Vulnerability Assessment Committee and the Namibia Early Warning and Food Information Unit (NEWFIU) of the Ministry of Agriculture, Water and Rural Development, most households in Caprivi and Kavango have used up their stocks of cereal. "People, particularly in the two regions, have begun adopting extreme coping strategies, such as reducing the number and size of their meals," said Lesley Losper, an agricultural economist with NEWFIU. The assessment said the cereal harvest had dropped by 76 percent in Caprivi and by 44 percent in Kavango at the end of 2005, compared to the previous year. Namibia is facing a cereal shortfall of 90,000 mt in the national annual requirement of 305,400 mt. NEWFIU said the number of Namibians in need of food aid would only become clear after an early harvest forecast for 2006, to be conducted next month. The joint study noted that prospects for the 2006 cereal crop remained uncertain. Rainfall performance records indicate drier than usual conditions compared to 2005, while a greater likelihood of normal to below-normal rainfall has been forecast for most parts of Namibia. Namibia's Emergency Management Unit (EMU), which determines the numbers in need of food aid, said it was awaiting next month's forecast report, but added that up to 18,000 people in the two regions had needed aid last year. However, the EMU warned that while rain in the drought-affected western Caprivi and Kavango has been beneficial, an incessant downpour in eastern Caprivi could result in floods. "The water in the Zambezi [river] is rising rapidly," said EMU Deputy Director Gabriel Kangowa. Flooding is a seasonal problem in the area.