1 in 5 kids malnourished
2005-05-03 15:01
Paris - The humanitarian organisation Action Against Hunger (ACF) called on the international community to take measures to ensure that food shortages in Mali and Niger do not worsen, turning into a famine.
"The investigation done in the Mali region of Kidal shows that one in three children under the age of five is suffering from acute malnutrition," said the organisation in a press statement.
"There is a lack of pasture for livestock because of the drought and the locust invasion at the end of 2004," said the Paris-based ACF.
"The dry season has begun, there is a very high risk of famine in this zone" in the far north-east of landlocked Mali close to the Niger border, warned Carole Lambert, head of food security for ACF.
"If we do not intervene immediately, many communities will lose their livestock, which is their only means of subsistence, and they will be in danger in the coming months."
- AFP