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Drought in West Africa brings concerns, but still room for hope

By Felix Rivera
Catholic News Service

WASHINGTON – The dried lemon-looking fruit known locally as "anza" has long-term, dangerous side effects, but for some residents of Niger, it is all they have to eat.

In the West African country suffering from drought and famine the fruit has become a commodity, said Lisa Washington-Sow, Catholic Relief Services' country representative for Niger.

A recent study by the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs estimates 7.8 million people in Niger face extreme malnutrition brought on by prolonged drought. This number accounts for more than half of the 15 million people living in this semi-arid African nation long used to cyclical droughts and famines.

Washington-Sow, who took over as CRS country representative in the midst of Niger's 2005 drought and famine, told Catholic News Service in a telephone interview that this year has already been worse than that one.

For example, Niamey, the capital of Niger, has exceeded the malnutrition threshold, putting organizations like the U.S. bishops' Catholic Relief Services on edge.

"People are eating less and making less money," Washington-Sow said June 29.

Grazing land has diminished because of the drought, causing problems for communities that rely on such land to feed cattle or other livestock. Such land "is very critical for Niger as it is directly linked to general food security," she said.

Washington-Sow predicted the situation will continue to decline throughout the year even though the harvest in September and October is expected to be good.

She said CRS staffers are working to revamp their food-voucher programs, increase their food distribution and educate Niger residents on more efficient use of resources – especially grazing land.

Carla Fajardo, who heads up CRS programs in Chad, faces similar problems.

If 2005 was a bad year for Niger, 2008 is the year to remember in Chad, she said.

"The echoes of the crisis of 2008 are still very recent," she said. "The people are still weary."

That year, a rebel uprising occurred around the same time the crisis in Sudan's western region of Darfur began to creep closer to the Chad-Sudanese border.

In the capital of Chad, N'Djamena, militant groups attempted a coup, causing many of the humanitarian organizations -- including Catholic Relief Services – to leave the area.

"The rebels looted our office and took all of the major assets," Fajardo said.

Now, Fajardo said the rebels have stayed near the east, close to the border of Sudan. Still, two international workers were abducted in June and a nongovernmental organization was attacked.

"People are in expectation mode, they are concerned about what might happen," Fajardo said. Yet with all the worries of a famine and mass exodus, Fajardo said matter-of-factly, "This is the reality of Chad."

Though security problems are frequent, Fajardo said humanitarian agencies' work is essential.

"If organizations don't provide support for the people, then they (people) will have an even harder time recovering from the drought," she said.

John Magrath, a climate change researcher for Oxfam Great Britain, said weather rules the people of West Africa.

"The people that live in West Africa, an area that is on the cusp of the Sahara, are highly vulnerable to extremely small variations in rainfall," Magrath said.

He said to lessen the effects of the food crisis, farmers have developed techniques that work to conserve moisture in the ground, important for an area where it is almost impossible to predict the amount of rainfall in any given season.

"The farmers are actually using fairly ancient techniques" used thousands of years ago when similar droughts occurred, Magrath said.

"In the end, everything depends on how good the rains are," he said. "They are the most important factor in nature."