Placido Hilukilwa
A FEW weeks ago, Northern subsistence farmers were still seeing promising signs of a bumper harvest this year, but the mood has now changed drastically as the result of a prolonged dry spell that affected vast areas in the northern regions.
The farmers’ hope had vanished after several rainless weeks.
Travelling through parts of the Omusati and Oshana regions, one is struck by the absence of rainwater in the oshanas, the fading pastures and the young crops that have dried or are drying up.
“We are in trouble,” said Nelago Wilbard, a subsistence farmer in the Okahao constituency in the Omusati Region.
She continued: “I worked my fingers to the bone and did spend a lot of money hiring a tractor to plough my mahangu field, but my crops have now completely dried up. There is no longer any hope for us,” she said, adding that the current situation appears to be a repetition of “the calamity that befell us” in 2019.
However, there are still some pockets of hope.
“It has not rained for some time at our area, but our crops are still in good condition. However, we too might face a serious drought if it does not rain this week,” said Linus Tobias who farms at Indongo yaKeelu village in the Oshikoto Region.
Retired teacher Lameck Kamunyengo Shilongo, who is the headman of the Ondjabayalala village in the Ohangwena Region, said that crops in his village and the surrounding area are still in good condition and a light rain was recorded in the area Sunday afternoon.
