UN fears continuity of drought situation will leave communities unsupported in future
Zorana Jantze
THE United Nations (UN) Assistant Secretary General and Climate Crisis Coordinator, Reena Ghelani has said that almost 50% of the Namibian population is facing hunger, meaning that they cannot afford more than one meal a day, and that long-term solutions need to be implemented as the long term nature of the climate nature raises fears that communities may not able to be sustained in future by government support.
Ghelani made these remarks at a briefing held in Windhoek, where she appraised the media on the outcome of her two-day mission to assess Namibia’s El Niño-induced drought situation.
“The harvest in some regions is 50% of what is should be, whilst in others it is less 30% of what it should be. Communities are really facing hunger, almost 50% of the Namibian population is in a hunger situation, meaning they cannot afford more than one meal a day on the table, and need support. The government has been swift with food, nutritional and water support, but there is still a gap, and more is needed on the side of food assistance and nutrition.,” Ghelani said.
She added that the visit by the UN representatives was necessitated by the fact that the El Niño impact is one of the worst that has been felt, and that the drought is the worst drought which has been experienced in a 100 years and that the situation is dire.
“The government and the president himself declared a State of Emergency, so as the UN we have come in solidarity, to see what the government response is, which has been swift, what more the gaps are, and to plead to the international community to show support.” Ghelani said.
The Deputy SG of the UN added that UN agencies have looked at how they can prepackage the support to provide emergency assistance.
“I saw that some support is being provided already in the pediatric hospital in the Omaheke, UNICEF and WFP provides, further assistance to farmers, to get greenhouses going as well as feeding programmes in schools. The international community needs to provide more, there is a gap. Climate crisis is not going away. We have the fear that we will see more droughts unsustained, we need to help communities help themselves. That is some of the discussions we have been having, how do we built resilience, or the ability of communities feeding themselves despite climate change. We looked at the various programmes and opportunities that the government has, and the Basic Income Grant is one of the components. The UN is also doing cash distributions to enable purchasing power for better nutritional choices. Government said that it is looking ahead and looking to work with the private sector, such as the provision of insurance in drought situations. ” Ghelani said.
She added that due to the El Niño phenomenon, there is a warming of the Pacific Ocean which affects land temperatures, so in the southern part of Africa it means temperatures increase.
Ghelani said that the world for 12 months straight has witnessed the highest temperatures that it’s seen since pre-industrial times, as it is over 1.5 degrees right now.
“El Niño has further impacted that. La Niña is the sister to El Niño, what that means is that temperatures fall quickly over the ocean, in some parts of the world it creating cyclones and tornadoes, whilst here it is expected to create more rain. We are keeping our fingers crossed that we see good rain, however, this can also lead to flooding and we are getting ready for that. ” Ghelani said.
According to the June 2024 Drought Situation report released by the Office of the Prime Minister, the updated projection conducted by the Office of the Prime Minister on acute food insecurity population between July 2024 – September 2024, suggests that about 1, 4 million people (translating to 48% of the total population) are expected to be food insecure.
The food assistance under the current comprehensive nationwide drought programme is benefiting 341,855 households (inclusive of 33,105 marginalized households and 1,835 Malnutrition households).
The financial implications of the drought relief programme will cost government about N$ 1.3 billion, whilst currently it only has about N$ 829.9 million, leaving a funding gap of about N$ 482 million dollars.
