Harare, Zimbabwe
9 July 2003 19:36
The United Nations (UN) warned on Wednesday that famine risks were increasing
because of political and bureaucratic delays by the Zimbabwe government in
appealing for emergency food aid.
A humanitarian situation report by UN agencies in Zimbabwe said current stocks
of foreign donated food will run out in August when tens of thousands of
Zimbabweans are expected to need food aid. It said more than 5-million people
will need emergency aid before next year's harvests.
The government had promised to release in early May its forecasts on local food
production this year, enabling donors to consider a formal appeal for help and
assess the country's food aid needs.
No appeal for aid, which must be accompanied by the local crop forecasts, has
been received, the UN report said.
"Several major donors have made it clear they require such an appeal before
committing resources to fund food aid," it said.
The UN said it takes at least three months from the time of a donor pledge until
food aid is delivered. Because of the lag, UN officials said they feared aid
would not be available for those facing starvation in September and the
following few months.
Two months after it was expected to release them, the government has given no
reasons for not announcing its official crop forecasts or submitting a formal
appeal for aid.
Donor agencies have blamed divisions within the government over making public
crop forecasts that might cast doubts on the success of President Robert
Mugabe's land reform programme that saw thousands of white-owned commercial
farms confiscated and handed over to resettled black peasant farmers in the past
three years.
Zimbabwe once helped feed much of southern Africa. Food production, however, has
been wrecked by erratic rains and the state's often violent seizure of most
commercial farms.
Many large farms that were given to ruling party supporters are lying fallow.
Others have been carved into small subsistence plots occupied by families
without access to fertiliser, tractors and other equipment.
The UN report said its food agency, the World Food Programmme (WFP), remained
"extremely concerned about the lack of food security and the very limited
supply of food in Zimbabwe in the coming year".
Last month, the WFP said almost half of all Zimbabweans will need food aid at
least until next year's harvest in April to avoid starvation.
Crop assessments by the WFP and the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation showed
Zimbabwe will have to import more than half of its staple food during the next
nine months.
Their assessments said Zimbabwe will need to import an estimated 1,27-million
metric tons of cereals – maize, the staple, and wheat -- to feed 5,5-million
people, or 47% of the population.
Once a formal appeal is made, international aid was likely to provide just under
half the imports, leaving the government to buy the rest.
The southern African nation is facing its worst economic and political crisis
since independence in 1980. Mass famine was avoided this year only by foreign
humanitarian aid.
An estimated 70% of Zimbabweans are unemployed and inflation has soared to an
official rate of more than 300%.
Farm seizures and political violence since 2000 have disrupted production of tobacco,
the main hard currency earner, and slashed hard currency earnings from mining,
industry and tourism, leading to acute shortages of food, gasoline and essential
imports. - Sapa-AP