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Driving through the inhospitable Marsabit Desert
Food Crisis in Kenya
Elizabeth Owuor Oyugi from our Kenya office talks about the devastating impact of the famine, and how our work is being affected.
Kenya is experiencing one of the worst food shortages in recent times, due to a massive drought that is the result of successive poor rainfall in recent years. This is affecting around 3.5 million Kenyans, mainly in the arid and semi arid areas in North Rift, north eastern and eastern parts of the coast. The situation has been exacerbated by the crisis in Somalia, which has led to hundreds of thousands of people fleeing across the border to Kenya in recent weeks. What's more the Kenyan shilling is free falling in value, reaching a 17 year low against the US dollar.
The affect on Sightsavers in Kenya
Sightsavers programmes in these areas are already feeling the effect of the drought. A recent mass distribution of antibiotics to treat trachoma in Samburu District in the North Rift fell short of meeting the target minimum 80% of the population. Community members failed to turn up to take the drugs as they were searching the desert for food, or simply couldn't take the drugs due to extreme hunger.
In Turkana, where we intend to scale up our trachoma control efforts before the end of the year, communities are also feeling the effects of an extreme shortage of food. They face the real prospect of starving to death. In Marsabit County, (the Comic Relief project area) the food crisis is so bad that pastoralists, famed for their love of animals, have no choice but to sell their livestock on for a fraction of what they are worth (100 Kenyan shillings = roughly $ 0.9).
For these Kenyans, many of whom are sprawled in hunger on the dusty bowl that is their region, life has become an endless nightmare from which many will never wake up.
Efforts by humanitarian organisations, such as the Kenya Red Cross who are already on the ground coordinating the government food relief programme and school feeding programmes, while laudable, are a drop in the ocean in comparison to the need.
Sightsavers will continue to monitor the situation on the ground through partner organisations, as well as the International NGOs Forum that is a monthly development think-tank meeting of major international organisations working in Kenya and to which Sightsavers is a member. Sightsavers will also ensure close coordination with humanitarian organisations in scheduling its programme activities so as to minimize any impact the food crisis might have on rolling out its various projects.
