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Community
Assessment of the Food Situation in Zimbabwe - October 2003
National NGO
Food Security Network (FOSENET)
November 27, 2003
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This twelfth
round of NGO and community based monitoring nationally covers the
month October 2003. This round of monitoring includes information
related to food access, food security-production- poverty links
and coping strategies.
Coverage
of the data
The monitoring information is collected from sentinel wards within
districts. It is presented by district, to provide for two or more
site reports on any indicator. Data for the period October 2003
is drawn from 144 monitoring reports from 55 districts from all
provinces of Zimbabwe, with an average of 2.6 reports per district.
Summary
- Three quarters
of the districts continue to report a deteriorating food supply
situation, especially for the elderly, orphans, the unemployed,
people living with AIDS and displaced farm workers.
- In and out
migration has increased, with over half of the districts affected
as people move primarily to hunt for maize and jobs, to avoid
the escalating urban cost of living and for rural youth, to do
gold panning as the only way to raise money to buy food.
- Seed availability
has improved somewhat with a third of districts reporting seed
to be available commercially, but only a quarter districts reporting
that fertilizer was available. Highest availability is reported
in Midlands, lowest in Mashonaland East.
- Some of the
improvement in supply can be attributed to new seed distribution
schemes. This has improved access to seed, although with some
report of exclusion of opposition supporters and of people selling
seed obtained from this scheme.
- Insufficient
supply and high demand has pushed the prices up. Maize seed prices
are reported to have risen by a further 20% in less than thirty
days and are now reported to be up to $60000/10kg in the formal
market.
- Many reports
indicated that people want support for seed and fertilizer at
this stage farm more than for food handouts.
- GMB deliveries
are reported to have improved in a quarter of districts and reported
to have remained low or fallen in the remainder. There were also
no major changes reported in GMB grain prices in October. The
average number of reported deliveries to sentinel wards was 0.1
compared to 0.22 in September and 0.18 in August. Deliveries of
0.61 tonnes on average per ward were reported, a marked decrease
on 2.7 tonnes in September and 2.3 tonnes in August. Monitoring
sites in half of the districts reported no GMB deliveries at all.
- While grain
sales to GMB are reported to have stopped this month, there are
some continuing sales reported to the parallel market, particularly
as farmers try to secure cash for inputs.
- Commercial
food availability is slightly better than at the same period last
year, using maize meal and oil as indicator foods. High prices
are reported to be the major obstacle in accessing commercial
market food. The parallel market is also preferred to the formal
market because people can buy maize meal and sugar in smaller
quantities, thus needing less cash to meet requirements for a
day's meal.
Visit the FOSENET
fact sheet
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