« West African Food Crisis | Main | Muslims help Burkina »

August 09, 2005

Famine or no famine?

The BBC report that the Niger president, Mamadou Tanja, denies there is a famine in his country.

In strict definition at least, it seems he is correct. The most useful report on the situation seems to be this one by FEWS, the famine early warning system. In response to the question "Is there now or will there soon be a famine or mass starvation in Niger?" they state:

Food crisis, not famine
"There is a very severe, but localized, food security crisis in some pastoral and agro-pastoral areas of northern Maradi, Tillabery, Zinder, and Tahoua regions caused by an early end of last year’s rains, locust damage to some pasture lands, current high prices of food, and chronic non-food causes of malnutrition. In these areas, high malnutrition rates, some of which reveal severe local problems, will inevitably be accompanied by increases in the “normally” high levels of infant mortality." They state this is the consensus between the Niger government, WFP, FAO, CILSS, and FEWS NET on the "locally severe, but non-famine nature of the crisis.

If the media have exaggerated the extent of the crisis, there yet remains a crisis - a "locally severe" food crisis. Aid agencies report children dying of hunger every day. In this, President Tanja seems to be going against the consensus, by claiming the situation is not worse than usual, and in seeing some political plot behind the claims of famine.

The state of the Niger Government
Yet M Tanja is not a tyrant or despot. Indeed, he was welcomed to the White House by George Bush less than two months ago, and was praised, along with four other African presidents for the "strong statement that these leaders have made about democracy and the importance of democracy on the continent of Africa." He is Niger's first elected president to complete his term without assassination or coup.

FEWS says: "Within the limitations of its own resources, the Government of Niger has been responsive to the current food security crisis in its continuous and collaborative monitoring and assessment of conditions, subsidized cereal sales from reserve stocks, a “loaning” of cereals in affected areas until the next harvest, and more recently, in distributing free food."

Long-term Poverty Issue
The FEWS report raises other interesting issues with the West African food crisis, and is worth serious reading. One main point that comes through is that - while we need to address the current crisis - it is the long-term poverty issues that need to be dealt with if the crisis is not to recur:

"This food crisis is not just a temporary emergency. It is the predictable and inevitable result of inadequately-addressed chronic poverty in the world’s second poorest country. Although the willingness of much of the world to address these “famine” conditions in Niger is appropriate and welcome, without a similar commitment and prolonged attention to addressing the chronic issues that are at the heart of the current localized crises, the same problems will re-occur again soon."

Tags: niger africa aid famine food crisis tanja

Posted by Keith at August 9, 2005 07:53 PM

Comments

Posted by: wilsonian at August 9, 2005 11:17 PM

Posted by: Garth at August 11, 2005 06:35 AM