Oxfam slams slow response to drought
0 Comment(s)
Print
E-mail
China Daily via agencies, July 21, 2011
International aid organization Oxfam accused several European governments of "willful neglect" on Wednesday as an $800 million aid shortfall slowed the international response to the deteriorating drought crisis in the Horn of Africa.
![A malnourished Somali child drinks water at southern Mogadishu's' Banadir hospital on Tuesday where medics have said most of the displaced children are ill and have been treated for severe malnutrition. [AFP]](http://images.china.cn/attachement/jpg/site1007/20110721/0014222d98500f91cb4b12.jpg "A malnourished Somali child drinks water at southern Mogadishu's' Banadir hospital on Tuesday where medics have said most of the displaced children are ill and have been treated for severe malnutrition. [AFP]") |
|
A malnourished Somali child drinks water at southern Mogadishu's' Banadir hospital on Tuesday where medics have said most of the displaced children are ill and have been treated for severe malnutrition. [AFP] |
The British charity said that of the estimated $1 billion needed to stave off a humanitarian disaster in the drought-hit region that straddles Somalia, Kenya and Ethiopia, only $200 million in new money had been stumped up.
"There is no time to waste if we are to avoid massive loss of life. We must not stand by and watch this tragedy unfold before our eyes," said Fran Equiza, Oxfam's regional director.
"The world has been slow to recognize the severity of this crisis, but there is no longer any excuse for inaction," Equiza said.
Parts of southern Somalia are suffering from famine and tens of thousands of Somalis have already died in the worst hunger emergency in a generation, Mark Bowden, the UN's top official in charge of humanitarian aid in Somalia, said on Wednesday.
The last time conditions were this bad was in 1992, when hundreds of thousands of Somalis starved to death. That famine prompted intervention by an international peacekeeping force, but it eventually pulled out after two US Black Hawk helicopters were shot down in 1993.
The southern Somali regions of Bakool and Lower Shabelle regions are suffering from famine, Bowden said. Across East Africa, more than 10 million people need aid.
"Somalia is facing its worst food security crisis in the last 20 years," Bowden said. "This desperate situation requires urgent action to save lives."
Famine is officially defined as when two adults or four children per 10,000 people die of hunger each day and a third of children are acutely malnourished. In some areas of Somalia, six people are dying a day and more than half of children are acutely malnourished, Bowden said. Prices of staple foods have increased 270 percent over the last year.
"If we don't act now, famine will spread to all eight regions of southern Somalia within two months, due to poor harvests and infectious diseases," Bowden said.
"We still do not have all the resources for food, clean water, shelter and health services to save the lives of hundreds of thousands of Somalis."
He said it was unlikely there would be any respite from the drought until the end of the year.
The drought has killed up to 90 percent of livestock in some regions, Oxfam said. But poor governance is also to blame.
Neighboring Djibouti, Ethiopia and Kenya have also been badly affected, and Eritrea is also believed to be hard hit.
Oxfam says the drought has been exacerbated by poor governance and neglect, war in Somalia and land policies that restrict grazing land for nomadic communities.
Go to Forum >>0 Comment(s)