05398
August 2, 2005

PDA sends $10,000 to famine-plagued Niger

Despite aid efforts, 3.5 million people
in West African country face starvation

by Evan Silverstein

LOUISVILLE — Presbyterian Disaster Assistance (PDA) has sent $10,000 in initial emergency relief aid to famine-stricken Niger.

     The money, from the One Great Hour of Sharing offering and designated disaster funds, will be used to buy more than a ton of millet, milk powder, seed and cattle fodder for thousands of villagers in the hardest-hit regions.

     A locust invasion last year, followed by a long drought, has triggered Niger’s worst food shortage in two decades and left millions of people in the West African nation in danger of starvation.

     “It’s unfolding, it’s deteriorating and it’s going to be large,” PDA Coordinator Susan Ryan said of the crisis. “This is a very initial response. We’re still determining which partners we’re going to work through.” 

     PDA, which announced the contribution last week, is responding to an appeal from Action by Churches Together International (ACT), a Geneva-based international alliance of churches and relief agencies, of which PDA is a member. ACT has asked for a total of nearly a half-million dollars.

     An estimated 3.5 million people in Niger face starvation, according to the government. The United Nations says more than 800,000 children under age 5 are suffering from hunger, including 150,000 children who show signs of severe malnutrition.

     Last year’s crop-devouring locust swarms ravaged about 7,000 square miles of farmland in Niger, a country of 11.5 million people that is among the world’s poorest nations.

     The ACT money will be used in support of two of its long-term members, Swiss Interchurch Aid (HEKS) and Lutheran World Relief (LWR), which have worked in Niger for years and have mechanisms in place to respond, Ryan said.

     HEKS, through four partner organizations, hopes to deliver 1,125 tons of emergency provisions to 50,000 people in 55 villages and settlements in the severely stricken Tahoua and Maradi regions, according to a summary of the ACT appeal.

     The appeal calls for 600 tons of millet, 10 percent to be reserved for seed; 50 tons of milk powder, mostly for children; 475 tons of animal fodder (cotton cores and grain chaff);and 4,520 salt blocks to supply essential minerals to farm animals.

     Thirteen clay-brick cereal banks have been built, and committees are being formed to manage the cereal supplies as well as food banks for cattle.

     The initiative targets those who have remained in their homes, especially women, children, the elderly and cattle farmers. Many residents have fled to refugee camps, feeding centers and hospitals.

     Under the program, aid will continue through September, when a new harvest is expected to ease the famine conditions, the ACT appeal said.

     Meanwhile, the LWR is developing a proposal for additional humanitarian aid for consideration by the ACT alliance.

     In Niger, most people live on a dollar a day, according to the United Nations. Forty percent of children are underfed, and one out of four dies before turning 5.

     Milk, flour and meat are overpriced, according to published reports. Niger’s government sells millet for $18 per 220-pound bag, but for most people that is just as far out of reach as the unsubsidized price of $54.

     The situation is worsened by increasingly severe famines in neighboring countries of Mali, Burkina Faso and Mauritania.

     The U.N. World Food Program’s country director for Niger, Giancarlo Cirri, said recently that the food crisis is causing “some of the worst hunger I have ever witnessed.”

     Despite months of famine predictions, international food aid started arriving in Niger just last week. 

     Relief workers say as many as 25 percent of Niger’s population needs food assistance. They complain that the U.N., the government and other agencies should have started large-scale emergency aid much earlier.

     The U.N. first appealed for assistance in November, and got almost no response. In June, Niger’s government refused demands that it distribute free food. Officials have been sharply criticized for failing to do more to prepare for the food shortages.

     However, donations have jumped dramatically in recent weeks, because of increased media attention and donors’ responses to TV images of starving children, according to the U.N.

     Ironically, early last month the world’s attention was fixed on Africa, when leaders of the world’s leading industrialized nations pledged to double African aid to $50 billion and forgive the debts of 18 countries, including Niger. At the same time, 10 Live 8 rock concerts on four continents drew the world’s attention to Africa’s troubles.