- The rapid food and nutrition mid-season assessment was conducted from November 28 and to December 4, 2021.
- The report has also raised alarm that the drought spell experienced in the country last year led to the death of more than 1.4 million livestock.
Image: STEPHEN ASTARIKO
At least 2.8 million people are in dire need of food in the Northern part of the country.
The latest assessment report by the National Drought Management Authority released on Thursday show that the number of people in need of humanitarian aid has gone up to 2.8 million in December up from 2.1 million in August.
This is an increase by more than 700,000 in just five months.
The rapid food and nutrition mid-season assessment was conducted from November 28 and to December 4, 2021.
The report has also raised alarm that the drought spell experienced in the country last year led to the death of more than 1.4 million livestock in at least 15 counties.
The most affected counties, according to NDMA, are Garissa, Mandera, Marsabit, Isiolo, and Wajir with a cumulative loss of more than 500,000 cattle having died due to a decrease in short rains in the arid and semi-arid areas.
“The pasture is expected to last about two months. The late start to the current short rains has badly delayed or even deferred planting," the report said.
The report has attributed lack of access to forage to desert locust invasion in Mandera and tree locust infestation in Turkana.
The report further attributes insecurity in some areas of Marsabit, Isiolo, Turkana and Samburu and invasive plant species in Turkana, Samburu. Kajiado, Narok counties.
This comes barely a day after the Council of Governors raised alarm over the drought situation in the country, with Kilifi and Kwale counties having been flagged as being in extreme vegetation deficit.
The council attributed this to below average rains experienced in the country between the months of October and December.
They are now appealing to the national government and development partners to support counties to ensure provision of timely humanitarian assistance and the required drought response action to save lives and livelihoods.
Eight other counties have been mapped as experiencing moderate vegetation deficit. They include Garissa, Kitui, Lamu, Mandera, Taita Taveta, Tana River and Wajir.
“All is not lost. Rainfall performance has to some extent improved since the fourth week of December bringing some recovery in some parts of the ASAL areas,"CoG chairman Martin Wambora said.
"This is likely to sustain households and livestock for the next one month after which the dry conditions will prevail until March when the long rains are expected.”
The governors said even though the October to December 2021 short rain season led to a slight improvement in the water situation in the country, the rains were still below average.
Embu, Laikipia, Kajiado, Makueni, Meru, Narok, Nyeri, Samburu and Taita Taveta on the other hand have been identified as counties in the drought alert phase.
Garissa, Isiolo, Kilifi, Lamu, Mandera, Turkana, Kwale and Tharaka Nithi are at the alarm drought phase.
“In an effort to respond to the worsening situation, the county and the national governments carried out food distribution and livestock off-take programmes respectively,” Wambora said.
The government has been scaling up relief food distribution for vulnerable people in 23 counties.
This comes amid the ravaging drought to avert an emergency food situation in the worst affected areas of the country as drought worsens.
(edited by Amol Awuor)