Positive rain output

Increased rains in Niger this year promise a healthy farming season despite the negative consequences associated with the downpours, an official at Niger’s national weather centre told IRIN on Friday.

Niger depends mostly on rain-fed agriculture and so far 60 percent of the country’s weather stations have recorded well above average levels of rainfall. If the rains continue at the current rate, Niger would be able to make up last year’s food deficit. However, the rains have damaged or destroyed property and caused some flooding in which one person has died. Flood destroyed 478 ha of millet in the southwestern Tillaberi district earlier this month, the official said.