Nineteen million in Africa still threatened by drought despite improvements, United nations warns.

Nineteen million in Africa still threatened by drought despite improvements, United Nations warns

Despite major improvements in harvest conditions in most of the 20 African countries affected by drought, as many as 19 million people continue to be directly threatened by its consequences, according to the United Nations Office for Emergency Operations in Africa (OEOA).

In a special report on the emergency situation in Africa reviewing 1985 and 1986 emergency needs, the Office stated that improvements in many parts of Africa should not lull the international community into "a sense of complacency and false optimism'. The slightest climatic change, it noted, might push several countries back into a crisis situation.

Some $881 million in emergency relief assistance would be required during 1986, the report stated, of which $330 million would be needed for food aid, including transport costs. In Sudan alone, some $51 million would be necessary for local purchase and transport of food supplies from surplus to deficit areas. Local supplies rather than external food aid, it was stressed, should be purchased wherever possible in order to minimize disruption of local food production.

Estimated non-food needs of $500 million would be an urgent priority for 1986, the report said. Of that, $106 million would be needed for logistics; $55 million for health needs; $64 million for water supply and sanitation; $39 million for relief and survival items; and $161 million for agricultural inputs. In addition, $76 million would be required for refugee/returnee relief programmes in Sudan, Ethiopia and Somalia.

More than 80 per cent of aid in 1986 was destined for six countries that remain most critically affected: Angola, Botswana, Cape Verde, Ethiopia, Mozambique and Sudan. Of the other 14 countries still affected, many would continue to require food aid to cover part of their structural food needs and relief needs of refugees.

The Office called for funds to ensure availability of transport and distribution of relief assistance before the arrival of relief supplies, and prepositioning of relief supplies prior to the rainy season when access to isolated deficit areas became extremely limited.

In reviewing the events of 1985, the report stated that by December donors had pledged or contributed $2.9 billion of the $3.3 billion in requirements determined by the OEOA to cover total emergency needs for 1984-1985. The shortfall included $147 million of unmet food aid and $211 million of unmet non-food requirements including health, logistics and agricultural inputs.

Sudan situation called "anomalous' by Stong

Provinces in Western Sudan were threatening to "slip back into famine', warned Executive Co-ordinator of the Office of Emergency Operations for Africa, Maurice Strong, at a 20 January press conference. The situation in Sudan was "a bit of an anomaly', he said--on one hand there was a surplus of grain; on the other, 5 million people were starving. There were uneven crop yields, and farmers had not planted crops because of shortages of tools, seeds and oxen. In southern Sudan, a UNICEF convoy was on its way with vital supplies, such as medical goods, he said, but overall conditions were deteriorating.

Current food needs in Sudan were estimated at 517,000 tons, of which 370,000 had been pledged, said Mr. Strong. The chief donor, the United States, had provided 80 per cent of Sudan's emergency food needs in 1985, and was expected to pledge 50 per cent of needs for 1986, plus 50 per cent of transportation costs for the first 100,000 tons this year. Other substantial contributions had been pledged by the World Food Programme, using funds supplied by the Netherlands; by the United Kingdom, the Federal Republic of Germany, and the European Community; and by "Band Aid' and "USA for Africa'. Donors should deliver pledges promptly, he said, because climatic conditions such as flash floods expected in May could interrupt deliveries.

The situation throughout Africa remained "fragile', he said, with 19 million people facing emergency conditions. "While properly directing our attention to development, we cannot forget emergency needs', he said.

Worst-hit areas could repeat tragedies

On 25 March, the OEOA warned that the worst-hit areas of the faminestricken African countries could in the coming months see a repetition of the tragic scenes witnessed at the height of the crisis last year. Urgent donor response was therefore required if sufficient quantities of food and other essential relief supplies were to reach areas of special need before the rainy season, especially in Ethiopia and the Sudan.

Total outstanding emergency needs of affected countries stood at about $637 million, but that cost could escalate dramatically unless action was taken now to pre-position relief supplies in the needy areas.

Currently, four critically affected countries--Ethiopia, the Sudan, Angola and Mozambique--account for almost 80 per cent of the 18 million Africans still affected by the emergency. In all four, civil strife was an active component of the crisis, but in Angola and Mozambique, externally supported insurgencies had displaced hundreds of thousands of people, disrupted economic and agricultural activity and were the root cause of the continuing emergency.

The four countries need an estimated 2.5 million tons of cereal aid for 1985-1986, and $460 million in emergency non-food assistance.

Eleven other countries need $109 million in non-food emergency assistance: Botswana, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Chad, Lesotho, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Rwanda, the United Republic of Tanzania and Zambia.