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Church World Service Assists in Niger
A young girl outside of Niamey, the capital, waits for breakfast.
Photo: REUTERS/ Finbarr O’Reilly, courtesy www.alertnet.org
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NEW YORK/NAIROBI – Lack of significant rainfall in the 2004 planting season coupled with a massive infestation of desert locusts has created conditions of acute malnutrition for approximately 3.5 million people, a third of them children, in vast parts of Niger's Sahel region, at the southern tier of the Sahara desert. Years of economic decline and struggle have also weakened the capacity of people to react against these problems in one of the poorest countries of the world.
Humanitarian agency Church World Service is working in the areas of food security, health and nutrition, and livestock assistance with partners Swiss Interchurch Aid (HEKS) and Lutheran World Relief (LWR) in the communities of Tillaberi, Dakoro, and Tahoua, providing both immediate food aid to last through the October harvest, and seeds to ensure a harvest for next year. Initial plans call for five months of relief assistance for 52,000 people in the worst affected areas.
Currently, Doctors Without Borders reports admitting 1,000 children a week at each of its five emergency feeding centers for the past month -- all weak and emaciated from lack of food, many on the verge of starvation.
"Not only do people not have enough food, but there is little feed for livestock, and animals are also starving to death," says CWS Interim Director for Emergency Response Donna Derr. "Farming families make up over 80 percent of the population, and they are facing difficulty in sowing crops for next year. They lack seeds, and many are so weakened by hunger that they are unable to work in the fields. Food shortages in the Sahel are expected to become increasingly more critical until the new harvest begins in late September."
CWS support will include the provision of millet, 10 percent to be used for seed; milk powder (mainly for children); 475 tons of animal fodder; 4,000 salt blocks (mainly for livestock); and the construction of 13 additional cereal banks, as well as training and equipment to operate them.
Aid from the international community is finally beginning to come in, after months of dire warnings from the international relief community and the United Nations. The United States recently pledged an additional $7 million in emergency aid, to be added to the $6.1 million already donated, making the U.S. the largest contributor to the relief effort.
Contributions to support CWS Niger Food Insecurity (Drought and Locusts) response efforts may be made on-line or sent to your denomination or directly to: Church World Service, Niger Food Insecurity (Acct. #640-W), P.O. Box 968, Elkhart, IN 46515, or by calling 800-297-1516.
Media Contact:
Lesley Crosson, CWS/New York, 212-870-2676;
Jan Dragin, 781-925-1526;
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