Somalia, Ethiopia and Kenya face the driest conditions recorded in four decades. But the world is distracted by the war between Russia and Ukraine.
The World Food Programme estimates that up to 20 million people, including 5.7 million children, could go hungry this year. In Kenya, some 3.5 million are affected by severe food insecurity and acute malnutrition.
A senior United Nations official who visited northern Kenya observed that families were destitute, left with nothing after their livestock starved to death.
After three consecutive rainy seasons failed, and the fourth one imminent, any form of crop production has collapsed and more than three million livestock, the mainstay of pastoral livelihood, have died. Local communities believe this could be the worst drought in living memory.
In Somalia, a bristling drought is intersecting in complex ways with sectarian violence. Similarly, nearly 18 months of conflict between the government and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front has left more than 9 million people in a brutal path of famine-like conditions.
In sum, raging conflict, drought, a global pandemic, and global supply disruptions have precipitated a rapid deterioration of food security in the Horn of Africa.
According to credible models and recent observations, extreme weather events have become more frequent and severe in their impact. According to a new report from the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification released at the 15th Conference of Parties meeting in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire, the number and duration of droughts have risen by 29 per cent since 2000, caused an estimated $124 billion in economic loss globally and caused circa 650,000 deaths between 1970 and 2019.
Hence, the withering drought in the Horn of Africa is not an anomalous event. What is uncharacteristic is the prevailing global economic and geopolitical environment. A world still reeling from a devastating global pandemic; the war in Ukraine and its crippling effects on food and energy costs around the globe. What is also uncharacteristic is the horrifying lack of collective urgency on the part of the global community.
WFP estimates that more than $470 million will be needed to scale up humanitarian support for Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia. But according to a high-ranking diplomat, nobody has got any money. The global economy is feeble, Europe and North America are focused on the war in Ukraine. Moreover, the cost of humanitarian assistance is staggering; wheat prices are up 67 per cent since 2021, due to the war in Ukraine.
It is shameful that we are in the throes of a blistering, catastrophic drought despite months of early warning. For example, the government of Kenya declared the drought a national emergency in September 2021.
Early warning makes no sense if we don’t use the information to mobilise material resources to mitigate the impacts of drought on the most vulnerable, especially women and children.
Moreover, it is morally outrageous that we cannot mobilise a robust humanitarian response to save lives and rebuild livelihoods and economies in the months and years ahead.
The views expressed are the writer’s
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