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Food crisis: a disaster waiting to happen
Kholwani Nyathi, The Standard (Zimbabwe)
July 22, 2007

http://allafrica.com/stories/200707220027.html

BULAWAYO - Sixty-year-old Dorothy Ndlovu sits on the dusty pavement outside a tuck-shop in the sprawling suburb of Cowdray Park, looking at hordes of people jostling for maize meal.

She is among the first to join the queue at 5AM after concerned neighbours tipped her that the shop - one of the few serving the suburb of more than 10 000 - would receive supplies of the now rare commodity.

"I am too old for that," says Ndlovu, who looks after seven orphaned children. "Besides, I haven't had a decent meal in the last two days and where will I get the energy?"

She says she doesn't remember when the family last had three square meals a day. She is afraid the last 5kg bag of sorghum meal she bought from a World Vision Zimbabwe (WVZ) shop would run out soon.

It is the same story in almost every household in her neighbourhood. Evicted by the government during the notorious Operation Murambatsvina - which the United Nations says left nearly one million people countrywide homeless and millions others without a source of livelihood - hundreds of destitutes have found shelter in this new suburb.

Some faith-based organisations have been providing food handouts to the victims of the so-called clean-up operation but even they say donor fatigue might soon force them to wind up operations.

"There is no light at the end of the tunnel," said Pastor Ray Motsi of Churches in Bulawayo (CIB). "It's becoming more difficult for us to source food for our people as the numbers are increasing and I personally believe there is someone out there who is trying to make sure that we don't succeed.

"That's the tragedy of the whole situation." CIB has been looking after victims of the clean-up operation for the past two years.

The council warns that mass starvation is looming among urban dwellers unless aid agencies scale up their intervention programmes.

"We feed children under the age of five and those enrolled under our Antiretroviral Treatment (ART) programmes but the numbers keep increasing every day," said a council official at one of the feeding centers. "Very soon we will fail to cope."

Shortages of the staple maize meal are no longer uncommon in Bulawayo and the southern region, in particular, in the aftermath of a 95% crop failure during the 2006/7 season.

The country's second city of about 1.5 million people has gone without regular maize meal supplies for nearly a month.

In the last three weeks, shops have stopped selling maize meal altogether in response to the government price blitz to force businesses to revert to prices obtaining on 18 June.

The government has already declared 2007 a drought year but is yet to send a formal appeal to the United Nations to allow it to institute an international appeal for assistance.

According to a Famine Early Warning System Network (FEWSNET), Zimbabwe is facing its worst food shortages, yet with this harvest having only met just above 30% of national requirements.

FEWSNET is a United States Agency for International Development (USAID) network which monitors hunger, food availability and shortages across the globe.

In its latest food outlook report on Zimbabwe covering the period from March to July, the network said widespread crop failure caused by poor rainfall and a long-running economic crisis had combined to drastically slash food production in Zimbabwe.

The UN World Food Programme (UNFP) says because of crop failures in the southern provinces and escalating poverty in both rural and urban areas, around 2.1 million people will face serious food shortages by the third quarter of this year.

It says the number of people at risk will peak at 4.1 million in the first three months of 2008 - more than a third of Zimbabwe's estimated population of 12 million people.

The world body also notes in its report that an estimated 352 000 tonnes of cereals and 90 000 tonnes of food assistance will be required to meet their basic food needs.

The most affected provinces include Masvingo, Midlands and Matabeleland North and South. Three districts in Matabeleland South last week said the response by donors for urgent food assistance had been disappointing, sparking fears of a major crisis.

Angeline Masuku, the Matabeleland South governor, who early this year appealed to the government to declare her province a disaster area to help mobilise urgent food aid refused to comment on the worsening situation, referring questions to the Grain Marketing Board (GMB).

The government is yet to declare the province a disaster area making it difficult for potential donors to mobilise international support.

But GMB, acting chief executive officer, Samuel Muvuti, contends that the parastatal has enough maize stocks to feed the whole nation and attributes shortages to transport problems.

He said the parastatal is moving grain from the northern parts of the country because in the south, crops were almost a write-off. "There is a lot of maize in the country," Muvuti said.

In Matabeleland South, the San community who still survive as hunter gatherers, are reportedly the most affected by the crisis. Acting Tsholotsho District Administrator, Lydia Ndethi-Banda, warned recently that the San would die of hunger if donors did not intervene urgently.

"They now survive on wild fruit and some of it may be poisonous," warned Moses Dlamini, a villager at Mgodimasili, west of Tsholotsho business centre.

Meanwhile the government scoffed at food aid pledges by the United States and Canada last week, saying it was meant for opposition parties.

Sikhanyiso Ndlovu, the Minister of Information and Publicity, told the state media that the two countries were "trying to turn the people against the government" by making the pledges.

Canada donated US$3.3 million to the WFP, which will help the agency scale up its operations in response to the food crisis. On Tuesday, the US also announced that it would provide 47 000 tonnes of food assistance to the country.

"WFP is extremely grateful to the Canadian government for this very timely contribution to our Immediate Response Account, which will allow us to buy maize now so that we are ready to begin distributing it in September when tens of thousands of Zimbabwean families will start to run out of food," said Thomas Yanga, Deputy Regional Director for Southern Africa in a statement.

Announcing the release of the aid, the US State Department said the government's ongoing price blitz, forcing businesses to roll back prices, had worsened the food crisis.

"The regime's reckless attempts to address self-imposed hyperinflation have resulted in the arrest of at least 2 000 businesspeople, widespread hoarding and profiteering by police and government officials, and shortage of basic staples," the department said in a statement.

"Its irresponsible economic policies will only worsen inflation, unemployment, growing food shortages, and poverty."

The Minister of Agriculture, Rugare Gumbo, said the government was still carrying out an assessment of the food situation before making a formal appeal to the UN, but the world body warned last week that time was running out to send out appeals.

Zimbabwe requires about two million tonnes of maize for annual consumption but estimates show that this year Zimbabwe harvested a mere 400 000 tonnes of maize, the country's main staple.

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