Where El Nino rules it means hunger
Pastor Dale Morgan
*Where El Nino rules it means hunger*
By James Painter
BBC News, West Timor
Aureliana Siki is soon to give birth to her third child.
But she seems far more anxious about her second child than the imminent
arrival of another.
"She just won't eat, she's always getting sick and having diarrhoea,"
she says of her 18-month-old daughter, Amelia Jessica.
"I am so worried she is going to die."
Amelia clings to her mother, listlessly.
She weighs just seven kilos and is officially classified as having
severe malnutrition.
I am giving my children three meals a day but I have had to reduce the
quantity in the portions
Aureliana Siki
West Timor mother
Aureliana is aware of one of the reasons why her daughter is severely
malnourished.
"The problem is that we had a bad harvest this year," she says.
"Instead of harvesting the normal four sacks of rice this year, we only
had two. And instead of 20 bunches of maize, we only had 10," she explains.
"I am giving my children three meals a day but I have had to reduce the
quantity in the portions."
Other women in Aureliana's village of Tes in a remote part of West Timor
confirm that they too have lost about half of their production this year.
They say some families are only eating twice a day. The reason is clear:
climate unpredictability.
Failing crops
Normally the wet and dry seasons are distinct. It rains from November to
March, and then is dry from April to October. This year the rainy season
was short, causing drought in some areas.
"Last year the rain did arrive in November," explains Yosefina Lake, a
39-year-old woman also from Tes, "but then it was dry again in December
and we lost a lot of our crop."
The women are anxious and sad. They say many children in the village are
losing weight. They know because every week they go to the government
health post in the village, known as the Posyandu, to have their
children weighed and measured.
Village of Tes, West Timor, Indonesia - photo: Tom Greenwood
Villagers in Tes blame climate unpredictability for poor harvests
Official figures show that of the 60 children under five living in Tes,
23 were under weight in July, and 13 had severe malnutrition.
West Timor is one of the poorest areas of Indonesia, and the district of
North Central District (TTU) where Tes is situated is one of the poorest
in West Timor.
In TTU alone more than 1,200 children are severely malnourished, while
in the whole of West Timor there are more than 9,000.
"There are several reasons why there is severe malnutrition here," says
Anton Efi from Yabiku, an NGO working in the area, "but unreliable local
food production is certainly one of them."
The villagers talk of God being responsible for the weather. They are
unfamiliar with the vocabulary of El Nino or climate change.
But climate experts say the weather unpredictability in 2006/7 here was
due to what is known as a "moderate El Nino year".
El Nino effect
El Nino is a warming of the central and eastern parts of the Pacific
Ocean, which generally occurs every four to seven years and is
considered responsible for disruptive weather patterns around the globe.
It is blamed for the drought this year in nearby Australia which is the
worst in a century.
Satellite images show differences in sea level in different colours
Guide to El Nino and La Nina
A report by the aid agency Care International in March warned that the
combination of failed crops and limited water access caused by El Nino
had triggered a "humanitarian crisis" in the area. El Nino had
contributed to a "serious decline in child nutritional status".
Some computer models have suggested that an increase in greenhouse gases
in the atmosphere will increase the frequency and intensity of El Ninos.
However, other models predict little or no change in how El Ninos occur.
Whatever the truth, officials at the Indonesian environment ministry are
clearly worried that in the future the climate could become more
unpredictable and cause more extreme weather events.
A detailed study released in June by the World Bank and the UK's
Department for International Development concluded that as "an
archipelago, Indonesia is very vulnerable to the impacts of climate change".
Food security, the report said, was "perhaps the largest concern".
"One of our urgent priorities," says Sulistyowati, assistant deputy
minister for climate change impact control, "is better equipment for our
weather stations to give accurate forecasts."
This, she said, would help farmers to know when to plant.
Aid projects
It is not all doom and gloom in West Timor. Various aid agencies are
working with local health officials to reduce long-term malnutrition there.
Village of Tes, West Timor, Indonesia - photo: Tom Greenwood
Tes is in one of the poorest areas of Indonesia
Aureliana, for example, is one of 500 villagers receiving training from
the development agency Oxfam in growing vegetables like tomatoes and
water spinach to diversify her family's food intake and income.
For the moment though, Aurelia's kitchen at the back of her wooden home
is virtually bare.
She is reluctant to show it, but all you can see are a few bunches of
maize hanging from the roof and some rice stacked in one corner. "Maybe
it will last us until October", she says.
Worrying times are ahead.
"We are very concerned about what we call the 'hunger gap months' from
October onwards," says Yanne Tamonob, Oxfam's local malnutrition project
manager.
"The harvest was bad and villagers may well have to eat the corn they
would have kept back for planting."