More food aid pledges needed to offset shortfall - report

Additional food aid pledges are needed to offset a rising shortfall in Kenya, where an estimated 2.3 million people in 26 districts are facing severe food shortages as a result of a prolonged drought, the Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET) reported this week. "As of 4 October 2004, confirmed pledges amounted to US $45.1 million out of the total food requirement valued at $81.3 million," FEWS NET said in its latest food security update on Kenya. It noted that although the cereals shortfall was likely to be met, less than 50 percent of the corn soya blend (CSB) and pulses requirement was so far available. "Food commodities need to be in the country by the end of December 2004 if distributions are to occur before the next harvest begins in early February 2005," FEWS NET said. The short rains were expected to begin in mid-October, and pastures and water sources should begin to improve, but little or no milk or crop output was expected until February 2005, the report said. Subsequently, household food security was likely to worsen, especially among pastoral households where rates of child malnutrition were beginning to rise. Since November 2003, the Kenyan government has distributed more than 75,000 mt of food to more than 1.5 million beneficiaries in both drought-affected pastoral and marginal agricultural districts. By early October, the government began to hand over emergency distributions to the UN World Food Programme (WFP), FEWS Net added. It said the short rains harvest would markedly increase household maize supply, helping to lower the prohibitively high food prices experienced during the past one and a half years. But as most of the marginal agricultural households also depended on farm produce as a major source of income, the lower prices may not benefit all equally. FEWS NET cautioned that some farmers and grain traders were trying to cash in on the high food prices by harvesting maize prematurely, exposing consumers to the risk of aflatoxin contamination. "Serious monitoring and enforcement of standards by relevant authorities is recommended at this time," it said. Eighty-one people died in May and June in the southern districts of Kitui and Makueni after eating maize contaminated with aflatoxin, a poison produced by fungi which grow on cereals harvested or stored under damp conditions.