International team to assess drought situation

A senior UN humanitarian official, who arrived in Eritrea this week, was due to meet President Isayas Afewerki on Thursday to discuss the drought situation in the country.

Kenzo Oshima, the UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, arrived in Asmara on Tuesday along with representatives of the UN, US and European Commission. The international team is due to assess the situation and make recommendations on the implementation of an emergency food programme.

An estimated 1.4 million Eritreans - more than a third of the country's population - are facing severe food shortages due to the prevailing drought.

“This is the worst crop devastation I’ve seen on the entire continent,” said Lauren Landis, director of Food for Peace, a subsidiary of the US Agency for International Development (USAID). “But I think famine can be avoided because we’ve had an early warning here, well before when the last harvesting of crops would have occurred in December.”

“I’m hopeful that the mobilisation effort that will be launched by the international community and the government will enable people in Eritrea to cope with the situation,” added Kenzo Oshima.

The international assessment team currently in Eritrea, toured Ethiopia earlier in the week where the government has forecast a worst-case scenario of 14 million people needing food aid next year.

The European Commission is scheduled to hold talks in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa next week to discuss ways of intervening in both countries.

In order to avoid famine, UN officials and the Eritrean government have said food aid will be needed through to the end of the next seasonal harvest in December 2003. International aid agencies have also said that emergency support to crop and livestock production is urgently needed to improve the country’s production capacity next year.