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UP TO 13 million people in West Africa are at risk from a food crisis according to Plan Ireland CEO David Dalton, who is visiting the region.
Irregular rainfall and attacks from locusts have decimated crops across the region, he said, leaving families with nothing to eat.
“The rains are effectively two months late,” he wrote on his blog from Niger, “which exacerbates the food gap between the harvests.”
Six million people in Niger alone are at risk from hunger. Prices for all cereals in the country are well above the seasonal average for the past five years, according to the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP), with the country now short of 500,000 tonnes of cereal.
Elsewhere in the region, cereal production has fallen by 62 per cent and 50 per cent in Gambia and Chad respectively, according to this WFP explainer. In Mauritania, crop yields are 34 per cent below their 5-year average.
In this video, Dalton speaks from Tillaberi refugee camp, where 4000 Tuareg people are now dependant on handouts after the rains failed.
(via PlanIreland/Youtube)
“Seeing young children and babies suffering from severe malnourishment, de-pigmentation and swollen limbs from lack of food was, as always, absolutely shocking,” said Dalton.
“It leaves an indelible mark whenever you experience this and see young children suffering from starvation and hunger. When you see the fear etched on the faces of parents. Severely malnourished children lose the ability to express themselves and so a great emptiness replaces the smiles and inquisitive looks that should be on their face.”
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As I have said before.
It is not ultimately a food crisis but an overpopulation issue in a region of our planet which cannott sustain such a large amount of people.
Birthcontrol and education are crucial in resolving this.
U hit the nail on the head. This is not like the Irish famine . Ireland has always being able to grow enough food. It’s having too many children in desert areas
This is not just a contraception issue, its also a cultural issue.
I work in maternity services and we have many African women having 12 or 13 children. These women and their husbands do not work and are a massive drain on this country.
You cannot expect people who are starving to go look for condoms when what they actually want is a bigger family as its ‘part of their culture’ to have massive families. It will take much more and years of education.
In work 2 weeks ago, I dealt with 2 African ladies, one pregnant with her 13th child and another pregnant with her 11th. 2 African women having the same number of children as 11-12 Irish women is not going to help Ireland.
I am only seeing this thread now, sorry…!
I interviewed Sorcha Nic Mhathúna Oxfam’s Communications Consultant on the crisis on Raidió na Life last month. I will be interviewing her again for an update. The interview below is in Irish but I plan to cover it as Béarla also next week.
have your say