Famine crisis threatening many in Sahel region

The crisis that is looming in the Sahel region of Africa threatens millions with hunger, and comes as world leaders convened this week for their Rio + 20 UN Summit to review how sustainable development can achieve poverty eradication in the world.

The drought in West Africa comes just a year after a similar emergency in East Africa claimed the lives of close to 100,000 people.

Tragically, the causes of both of these terrible events can be attributed in significant degree to human hands.

In 2011, the world watched as a drought developed into a fully-blown famine because of the behaviour of Somali militants Al-Shabaab, whose ban on foreign relief agencies forced tens of thousands to flee to refugee camps in neighbouring countries.

But this year’s unfolding crisis in West Africa’s Sahel also has a human dimension — as global climate change is being held responsible for what is shaping up to be the worst drought in the region in over half a century.

The drought is the third to have affected the region in the past decade, and in Burkina Faso, where Self Help Africa is working on a number of rural development projects, up to half of the rural population is affected.

In this, one of the poorest countries in the world, our staff on the ground report that small-scale farming families are down to their last supplies of grain. In the months ahead there is a danger that many will have consumed the seed they would ordinarily retain for the new planting season.

The rains only come once a year in the African Sahel, and following a season where rainfall was both patchy, and late, many harvests have failed, animals have died, and many are being sold by households to buy the food that they need to see them through.

The role that farming must play in combatting this challenge is vital.

Ray Jordan

CEO Self Help Africa

Kingsbridge House

Parkgate Street

Dublin 8