With rains having failed for the fifth consecutive year (femte år i træk) in Eritrea, causing crop failure and drying out major pasturelands, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) said Friday it has expanded its emergency operation in the Horn of Africa country to cover nearly a quarter of a million more people.
The 75 million US dollar, five-month operation launched this month was designed to assist 840.000 drought-affected people, 240.000 more than the original nine-month project, which ended last month, WFP said, but it added that the original emergency operation appealed for 50 million dollar and got 37 per cent less than that.
– The spring Azmera rains have begun to fall, but once again they are erratic, light and localized. Herders are migrating earlier and longer distances with their animals in search of grazing lands and many Eritreans must queue for hours at fewer and fewer water points. Even in the areas around the capital, water shortages are acute, with deliveries taking place only once or twice a week, WFP Country Director Jean-Pierre Cebron said.
Eritreans were selling livestock, producing and selling charcoal and skipping meals, while the Government was unable to pay for food imports because of the damage to the economy from the 1998-2000 war with neighbouring Ethiopia, the unfinished peace progress and five years of drought, WFP said.
Eritreas three most fertile regions – Anseba, Debub and Gash Barka – are at their driest since 1998. About half the children under 5 are underweight, as well as 42 per cent of pregnant and nursing mothers, one of the highest rates in Africa, WFP said, citing Ministry of Health statistics.
In addition to the extended emergency operation, WFP was continuing its two-year, 50 million dollar relief and recovery operation, targeting 300.000 people, mainly the internally displaced (IDPs), and feeding students in schools.
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