Joy and relief as hungry villagers tentatively reap first harvests

After five hard months of living hand to mouth, villagers in this corner of Niger gaze in wonder at the ears of millet ready for picking in the fields and allow themselves to hope that this year's harvest will put an end to their hardship. "We can breathe again. Thanks be to God," sighs Halilou Habou, one of 500 people living in Damana, a village more than 100 km east of the capital, Niamey. "Look at all this millet, it's ripe and ready to reap. And in a week, or maybe 10 days I'll be able to start harvesting my beans too." In 2004, one of the worst droughts in recent years combined with a locust invasion and deep-rooted poverty with disastrous effect in Niger. The UN estimates that almost a third of Niger's 12 million population are now affected by the food crisis hanging over the world's second poorest nation, with some 2.5 million people identified as extremely vulnerable and requiring food assistance. Damana lies just south of the 14th parallel that cuts a swathe across the arid Sahel region on the fringes of the Sahara desert and that experts say is often an area affected by food shortages. "The 14th parallel is always precarious, the zone most at risk" said Seidou Bakari, head of Niger's national food crisis unit. Although the village of Damana has not seen a treatment centre for malnourished children set up in its backyard, people here have nonetheless been hit by this year's food emergency. "We have really suffered. We lost lots of our animals. But for the past week, we have been starting to harvest the new crop," Habou said, gesturing at his two-acre expanse which has exceeded expectations. "For us at least, the worst is in the past." For many other hungry people in Niger, more suffering may be around the corner, however. UN Secretary General Kofi Annan last week urged the world to do more to save hundreds of lives every day and stump up the remaining US $40 million of an $81 million appeal for Niger. But one thing that has brought relief -- and in the case of the Damana villagers, the first crops -- is good rainfall. "2005 seasonal rainfall throughout much of Niger has been greater than normal, leading to very good agricultural conditions in most of the region," the US-funded Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET) said in its latest bulletin published last week. Niger's Minister for Agricultural Development, Labo Moussa, agrees the outlook is good across the semi-desert and landlocked country. "The meteorological conditions favour a good harvest, the rainfall levels are heavier than last year," he told reporters.

And according to statistics from his ministry, the harvest will be more widespread this year with at least 10,200 villages nationwide having planted crops by the end of July compared with 9,000 a year earlier. Down the road from Damana, lies the village of Tichola, where Issa Boubacar stands and rubs his hands at the sight of his burgeoning fields. This year they were spared crop-munching insects and blessed with regular rains. "I will certainly have between 150 and 200 bales of millet," he told IRIN, estimating a harvest of up to five tonnes. "That will allow me and my family of seven to get through next year without too much difficulty.” "It won't be a question of selling millet to buy other things next year," he continued. "This year's food crisis has taught us to watch our stocks." Back in Damana, Habou's wife, Hamsa, hopes the food shortages of 2005 have taught her husband a lesson too, but of an altogether different kind. She hopes he has realised how foolish it would be to take on a second wife. "Both we and our children have suffered too much for a man to lose his head and indulge in this madness," Hamsa told IRIN. "It's time he realised that he has to think ahead, think of the consequences."