Food aid cost soars
2007-10-18 12:21
London - A "perfect storm" of drought, conflict and rising costs has increased the ranks of the chronically hungry by millions of people and forced aid workers to find and fund longer-term solutions to the food crisis.
The United Nations says the number of chronically hungry
people worldwide rises by an average of four million each year.
At the same time global fuel prices have soared, pushing up
road transport costs and global maritime shipping rates.
The UN's World Food Programme (WFP) says the cost of
cereals has risen 50% over the past five years, which
experts say is due to the world's growing population -
particularly in non-food producing urban areas - combined with
bad harvests and an increased demand for cereal products in
previously rice-eating India and China.
Worst affected is sub-Saharan Africa
Conflict in some of the world's poorest regions has created refugee crises and experts warn climate change may promote more fighting over resources, demolishing coping strategies and pushing already vulnerable families over the edge.
WFP Africa spokesperson Peter Smerdon said: "It is a perfect storm. They all feed into each other."
Worst affected is sub-Saharan Africa, home to 21 of the 36
states worldwide requiring food assistance.
WFP says it is most concerned about Somalia where drought
and conflict have coincided to produce what some say is the
country's worst humanitarian crisis.
Violence has restricted handouts and fighting between the
transitional government, its Ethiopian allies and insurgents has
forced thousands to flee Mogadishu to makeshift camps.
The closure of the capital's main market - a food and job
lifeline which has been the scene of repeated fighting and was
recently burned - has also hit supplies and buying power.
In southern Africa, food crises in Zimbabwe and the kingdoms
of Lesotho and Swaziland share two causes: drought, which has
also hit regional producer South Africa and driven up prices,
and Aids, which has killed farmers and in turn cut output.
Zimbabwe's situation is exacerbated by the seizure of white commercial farmland for landless blacks which has hit output, critics say, and hyperinflation and economic collapse.
West and Southern Africa are largely at peace, making access
relatively easy but in East and Central Africa's war zones, many of the neediest are out of reach.
Crackdown on rebels blocking aid
New fighting in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo has
left WFP unable to reach a third of 300 000 new displaced, while in Ethiopia's Ogaden region government restrictions and a crackdown on rebels are seen blocking aid and trade shipments.
But while conflict continues to drive food shortages from
Sri Lanka to Colombia, hunger is more often caused by deepening
poverty.
Increasingly, aid workers say it is time to move beyond
handing out food as crises bite. They say simply speaking,
longer-term programmes could save money.
Aid group CARE International says its programmes in West
Africa's Niger, aimed at reducing poverty and building
sustainable agriculture, cost only around $30 a person - half
the price of providing food at the height of the country's 2005 food crisis.