An estimated 2.5 million people in northern and eastern Kenya are in need of emergency food aid due to poor rains last fall. The drought situation has triggered a food emergency and set in motion a series of crises from malnutrition to loss of livestock.

Presbyterian Disaster Assistance is responding to this crisis as a member of the global alliance Action by Churches Together (ACT) International. The current response of ACT members in Kenya has been put into place mainly to save lives where famine and malnutrition are becoming severe and to get people through the day-to-day crises by providing water and distributing food, among other efforts.

An appeal has been issued to respond to the drought and famine in a larger and more comprehensive way that will mainly address the immediate emergency needs of residents in the affected areas. There are also some components that will assist residents of drought-prone areas in lessening the effects of future droughts.

• Current situation
• Origin
• Measures taken
• Plans/entry points

It is hoped this can be a "starting block for much more intensive efforts between drought cycles." The link is in the long-term development in addition to emergency responses.

Following is a question and answer overview of the current situation provided by Sam Mutua, emergency response officer for ACT member Church World Service.

Q: What is the situation at the moment? How serious is it?:

A: The situation is extremely bad. As one example, one of the partners, Kenya Evangelical Lutheran Church (KELC), indicated that in Kajindo District, there is one person who died last week, and there are four people seriously in need of food in that family. They indicated the church will follow up on that. That area is not in their working area, but that of the Anglican Church of Kenya (ACK). Because of the networking among ACT members and partners, the KELC is able to respond.

Members are reporting that a serious drought is still continuing and that the situation is getting worse.

There is a feeling among the members that while food is being distributed, there is an unfairness of food not being distributed at the right time. National Council of Churches of Kenya (NCCK) also submitted a proposal that will step up the monitoring component and advocacy of its response, to see if food is being distributed fairly — by the government, by NGOs and by ACT members themselves. We bring this up so that we know where (and if) there are pockets of people not receiving food, despite the fact that NGOs and the government are distributing it. NCCK will ensure that the information will be lifted up and shared with members to make sure nobody is going without food. We are more or less addressing the whole question of availability and accessibility of food.

Q: What are the origins of the current situation?

A: For the last couple of years, some pockets of Kenya have been receiving poor rain. Some rains have been scanty; some areas have received none. People have been able to cope in the past, but their coping mechanisms have been eroded.

The climax was in December after the long rains did not come through last October and November. When farmers had already missed the short rains in April last year, the situation got worse.

Q: What measures have ACT members have taken so far?

A: Churches have done local fundraising through congregations and have donated food. There is a lot of local initiative.

Where our partners are working, for example, at Kakuma (a refugee camp, run by the Lutheran World Federation), it was reported today that the host community of the refugee camp has moved into the camp to provide resources, such as water. They have also stepped up the pumping of water at the camp to help the supply.

Q: What plans are in place to respond? What are the ACT members' entry points into the crisis?

A: Some will address access to food; others will provide access to water. Two members — Norwegian Church Aid (NCA) and ACK — want to do water tankering to bring water closer to families.

Basic water and food availability is one issue. After that, there is a great deal of mitigation issues — interventions that will mitigate the drought in the future. One example is a community with a water pumping system that can be expanded to hold more water to reduce the impact of drought when it comes. There's also a look at appropriate technology, such as dams.

There are quite a number of efforts being addressed. We don't want to see this happening in the same communities again. Our response will also consider the question of seeing which interventions work better to give people resilience when drought comes through.

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