Nepal: Emergency Food Op Starved for Donors
Karnali Messenger-Karnali Forum for Sustainable development
Marty Logan
URL: http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=34100
KATHMANDU, Jul 26 (IPS) - Scepticism among potential donors could
ground a United Nations plan to deliver emergency food aid to villagers
in Nepal's drought-hit northwest.
The U.N.'s World Food Programme has only raised 17 percent of the 5.4
million U.S. dollars it says it needs to buy and deliver rice and
fortified wheat to 225,000 villagers in 10 districts. The region faces
an annual "hunger gap", the period between harvests when crops run out
and people survive by buying food with what they earn as labourers or
with cash sent by relatives who have migrated to find work.
That historical trend is why donor nations, some of which contribute to
long-term development projects in the area, doubt that this year is
really different, says WFP Country Director Richard Ragan. "Donors met
us with a lot of scepticism," he told IPS on Tuesday.
Add to that the focus on political developments after April's "people's
revolution" forced King Gyanendra to give up power, and "this emergency
is kind of forgotten. We really believe it's serious but it's hard to
be a lone voice in the wilderness," added Ragan.
What makes this year different for the people living in the hills and
mountains of the area, many of whom must walk days to get to the
nearest market, is that last winter was the driest on record, and it
followed an unusually dry rainy season in 2005.
Already in May reports were emerging that villagers in the region were
selling personal items to raise money to buy food and, in remote areas,
some had resorted to eating herbs and roots.
A U.N. assessment mission in May found that wheat production had fallen
50-100 percent in 70 village development committees (VDCs) in the 10
districts. "When you have a succession of bad things happen, when
you're on the brink, one or two things can push you over the edge. And
I think that's what's happened," said Ragan.
Under the emergency programme, each targeted household in the 10
districts will receive two months supply of food (80 kg of rice and 14
kg of fortified wheat) one-half before and the other half after
completing 30 days of labour on a "food for work project", such as
building a mule trail. WFP says it wants to avoid the "welfare"
approach of giving recipients something for nothing.
Australia is the only nation to date that has contributed to the
emergency operation, and that was a "fortuitous coincidence", says
Ambassador Graeme Lade. His government had already decided to donate to
WFP's long-term work in the food-deficit region and when told of the
crisis, agreed to divert one-half of that money (365,000 dollars) to
the emergency.
In an interview, Lade confirmed that other potential donors are asking
"why is this year any different"? Another factor, he added is, "There
are lots of emergency situations around the world and it takes time to
prioritise. We had money to draw upon from our budget but maybe others
aren't in the same position."
Washington is "considering" the request and will decide by Friday, said
a spokesperson at the U.S. embassy in Kathmandu on Tuesday.
WFP has divided the emergency operation into three phases. In phase
one, nearly one-half of the total food aid (1,800 metric tonnes) will
be delivered to 110,000 people in the four southern-most affected
districts. In phase two, just over 1,000 mt will go to 65,000 locals in
two districts while phase three will target about 50,000 people in four
districts with just over 800 mt of food.
To date, phase one is about 50 percent complete, said Ragan, after WFP
borrowed rice from the Nepal Food Corporation and 500,000 dollars from
an internal account to purchase food. "I can feed the first 110,000
people but after that, I cannot" unless donations start arriving, he
added.
Another 4.5 million dollars is needed to finance phases two and three,
which will involve airlifting about one-third of the total food to be
delivered.
Asked if donors need to hear that people are "starving" before they
will act, Ragan replied that a member of parliament from Mugu, one of
the most remote districts affected, told him that when he arrived at
the airport there with rice to distribute, people ripped open the bags
and started eating the raw food. "That sounds to me like people are
pretty hungry," Ragan added with a wry smile.
One international worker who knows the drought area suggests that WFP
should have targeted Mugu, Humla and Jumla -- the most remote districts
and likely the hardest hit by drought -- first. A group from his
organisation travelled by foot through parts of the districts earlier
this month, added the worker who asked to not be identified.
"Our teams confirmed that things seemed quite serious. Water supplies
were drying up and there are no crops in the fields because of the
drought...they're already rationing food and have enough to get through
September. That is when the problems are going to occur."
But he acknowledged that "Understanding the situation is extremely
difficult -- valleys within the same VDCs can be in very different
circumstances".
Not only that, said Ragan, the situation could have changed since the
WFP did its assessments in the spring. "Targeting is not an exact
science...did we get it all right? Probably not," he said but the
agency's 30 monitors in the area gathered information from communities
and looked at various factors such as crop yields, access to markets,
coping strategies and access to irrigation before planning the
emergency operation.
"We're definitely not rigid...but at some point you have to make
targeting decisions and you can't go back on those," said Ragan. "We
know there are high degrees of vulnerability (in Humla, Jumla and Mugu)
but we just don't have the money to get there."
Regards,
Tek Jung Mahat
Kathmandu, Nepal
Email: tekjun...@gmail.com
Alternate Email: t...@mtnforum.org AND tma...@icimod.org
Tel/Fax: Available on request