The cyclone that struck the western coast of Myanmar at the end of October wiped out a large portion of the region’s expected annual rice harvest, placing some 260,000 people at risk of hunger.
“The timing of the cyclone was very unlucky. The cyclone hit right at the moment [before the harvest] when farmers empty their coffers and put everything into the crops,” said Tesfai Ghermazien, Myanmar’s senior emergency coordinator with the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).
“If their houses and dwellings were seriously damaged, then whatever seeds they had stored as back-up have now also been ruined.”
The cyclone destroyed more than 97,125 hectares of farmland according to FAO, or almost half the rice fields in hardest-hit Rakhine State in the west, where rice is the staple food. Eight million hectares nationwide are used to grow rice.
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) estimates 260,000 people will face food shortages with 200,000 in need of food assistance for the next three months in the four most severely affected townships of Rakhine state: Myebon, Kyaukpyu, Pauktaw and Minbya.
“It’s too late to do anything to help the farmers’ rice output [in Rakhine State] this dry season,” said Ghermazien. FAO is concentrating instead on helping fishing and small livestock industries.
By 20 November, the World Food Programme is expected to complete sending 1,355 tons of rice to affected areas and has government approval to procure locally more food staples to continue aid over the next three months.
Severe acute malnutrition in young children can rapidly increase without fast action, warned the UN Children’s Fund, which aims to distribute vitamins and micronutrient sprinkles to 15,000 children under five, and vitamin B1 supplementation to at least 6,000 pregnant or lactating women in Rakhine State.
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“The timing of the cyclone was very unlucky. The cyclone hit right at the moment [before the harvest] when farmers empty their coffers and put everything into the crops,” said Tesfai Ghermazien, Myanmar’s senior emergency coordinator with the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).
“If their houses and dwellings were seriously damaged, then whatever seeds they had stored as back-up have now also been ruined.”
The cyclone destroyed more than 97,125 hectares of farmland according to FAO, or almost half the rice fields in hardest-hit Rakhine State in the west, where rice is the staple food. Eight million hectares nationwide are used to grow rice.
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) estimates 260,000 people will face food shortages with 200,000 in need of food assistance for the next three months in the four most severely affected townships of Rakhine state: Myebon, Kyaukpyu, Pauktaw and Minbya.
“It’s too late to do anything to help the farmers’ rice output [in Rakhine State] this dry season,” said Ghermazien. FAO is concentrating instead on helping fishing and small livestock industries.
By 20 November, the World Food Programme is expected to complete sending 1,355 tons of rice to affected areas and has government approval to procure locally more food staples to continue aid over the next three months.
Severe acute malnutrition in young children can rapidly increase without fast action, warned the UN Children’s Fund, which aims to distribute vitamins and micronutrient sprinkles to 15,000 children under five, and vitamin B1 supplementation to at least 6,000 pregnant or lactating women in Rakhine State.
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This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions
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