'Bestiality' blamed for drought
2004-01-20 10:59
Godfrey Mandiwana, Riot Hlatshwayo & Joyce
Polokwane - Thirsty Limpopo villagers are so desperate for rain that they are planning to sacrifice goats to appease vengeful ancestors.
Xihosana villagers, near Malamulele in Limpopo, believe the drought is punishment by outraged ancestors after a local youth "raped" two goats.
Willy Shivambu, 22, was prosecuted and jailed for 10 months on bestiality charges late last year, but local farmers and sangomas are now demanding that both goats be sacrificed to appease disgusted ancestors.
"The goats have become a serious threat to our well-being. Bestiality is taboo in our culture, and we warned before the drought that the rains would stop unless there was retribution. Now the drought is destroying us. We have no choice but to sacrifice the animals in a special cleansing ceremony," says villager Xinghalana Chauke.
No drinking water
An estimated one million people, mostly rural villagers, have been left without drinking water in the province after 122 government boreholes, scores of rivers, and even major dams dried up during December in the worst drought to hit South Africa in almost 100 years.
Limpopo is the worst hit region in South Africa, but villagers are also desperate in Mpumalanga, Free State and KwaZulu-Natal.
National government estimates that 15 million South African may need food aid in the coming year, while an additional 100 000 Limpopo farm workers are at immediate risk because if crops fail farmers will be unable to pay them. Government has already allocated R265m to help parched villagers drill new boreholes or truck in emergency supplies of food and water.
But, Limpopo agriculture MEC, Dr Aaron Motsoaledi, warned this week that Limpopo which is tipped to get just R32m from the drought fund actually needs an estimated R900m to properly care for villagers, farmers, and industry hit by the drought.
Scattered rains in Limpopo's crop-growing areas have come too late, he said, for the planting of maize and other essential food crops, while even bushveld cattle ranchers, normally the backbone of South Africa's red meat industry, have resorted to the costly purchase of fodder just to maintain their small surviving herds after losing 30 000 cattle before Christmas.
Even wild animals, which have evolved to life in arid conditions, are dying in their thousands.
The South African Weather Service attributes the drought to global weather patterns and warns that chances for any further rain in Limpopo and other northern provinces this season is rapidly diminishing.
Water wars
But the drought hasn't gripped just South Africa. Scientists who gathered in Kenya to debate a looming world water crisis warned last month that agricultural production in sub-Saharan Africa is expected to shrink 23% in the next 20 years as a result of "inevitable" severe water shortages.
The impending "water wars" will also leave an estimated 831 million people thirsty and even poorer than they are today, warned scientists at the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) conference in Nairobi.
CGIAR's warning echoes similar concerns by the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), which warns that "if we want to avoid a regional food crisis, the key is to begin producing more food with less water by tailoring the choice of crops to the areas in which they are grown".
'No more mealie pap'
That might mean abandoning staple foods such as maize used to make mealie pap (porridge made of maize meal). Researchers stress that contrary to popular belief, maize is not a traditional African food. It was imported from its native home in Mexico, in Central America, by white colonialists almost 300 years ago to replace indigenous African crops such as sorghum and millet.
Researchers at the International Crop Research Institute for Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) in Zimbabwe have used ancient versions of the indigenous crops, which use less water than maize, to develop better varieties that now mature quicker and in some cases have better yields per hectare than maize.
The problem with maize, ICRISAT explains, is that it needs regular rainfall over a 90-day period. Millet and sorghum need no where near as much water.
Although the new drought resistant crops have already helped Tanzania shave R117m off its food import bills, and is being widely used by subsistence farmers in Zimbabwe, South Africa has no plans for mass distribution of sorghum or millet seed.
Emergency water
The government is instead relying on emergency water and infrastructure grants to the worst affected municipalities, with Limpopo's Bohlabela, Capricorn, Mopani, Sekhukhune, Vhembe and Waterberg districts getting a total R33.4m most recently receiving grants.
Vhembe is hardest hit, with 256 000 villagers without any drinking water.
But is isn't just rural South African who have been affected by the drought. Even Mpumalanga's leafy sub-tropical capital, Nelspruit, has had to impose severe water restrictions, banning all irrigation of the Crocodile River and warning that its satellite town of White River will run dry by the end of January.
Hungry refugees
And, if the drought persists, the region may have to cope with more than its own thirsty residents. Neighbouring Swaziland, just 80km away, is already describing the drought as the "worst in living memory" and warning it will need emergency international food aid. Major crops in the kingdom are failing, sparking fears of a wave of hungry refugees spilling over the porous border to better resourced South Africa.
The region's only other kingdom, Lesotho, is just as desperate after all its maize crops failed, while 4.5 million Zimbabweans are already relying on emergency rations from the World Food Programme.
"We South Africans are really suffering, with half our animals already dead and government water tankers our only source of water. But, our brothers across our borders don't even have water tankers, so we are perhaps lucky," muses Limpopo village chief Samuel Sinthumule. - Inter Press Service