Africa famine response ‘too little, too late’, Oxfam

NAIROBI – Food emergencies in Africa are occuring three times more often now than in the mid-1980s, but the global response to famine continues to be “too little, too late”, the international aid agency Oxfam said yesterday.

Conflict, AIDS and climate change are all exacerbating food shortages for sub-Saharan Africa’s 750 million people, with innovative solutions and massive long-term support needed to break the cycle, the British-based group added in a new report. “It will cost the world far less to make a major investment now in tackling root causes of hunger than continuing the current cycle of too little, too late that has been the reality of famine relief in Africa for nearly half a century,” Oxfam Britain’s director Barbara Stocking said.Billions of dollars of aid have been pumped into sub-Saharan Africa in recent decades, and its problems have received unprecedented international attention of late from grassroots campaigners and world leaders like Britain’s Tony Blair.But despite that, a “myopic, short-term” focus has prevailed, with emergency food aid still dominating international action on Africa, rather than long-term support of agriculture, infrastructure and social safety nets, Oxfam said.It cited this year’s drought in east Africa, where up to 11 million people still require urgent assistance, and renewed food insecurity in Niger, where at least 1 million people are vulnerable in coming months, as evidence of ongoing crisis.A third of Africans are under-nourished, Oxfam said, while the number of food emergencies has nearly tripled in 20 years.Nearly half of Africans live on less than a dollar a day.Conflicts cause more than half of food crises, Oxfam said, citing violence in north Uganda and Sudan’s Darfur region.-Nampa-Reuters”It will cost the world far less to make a major investment now in tackling root causes of hunger than continuing the current cycle of too little, too late that has been the reality of famine relief in Africa for nearly half a century,” Oxfam Britain’s director Barbara Stocking said.Billions of dollars of aid have been pumped into sub-Saharan Africa in recent decades, and its problems have received unprecedented international attention of late from grassroots campaigners and world leaders like Britain’s Tony Blair.But despite that, a “myopic, short-term” focus has prevailed, with emergency food aid still dominating international action on Africa, rather than long-term support of agriculture, infrastructure and social safety nets, Oxfam said.It cited this year’s drought in east Africa, where up to 11 million people still require urgent assistance, and renewed food insecurity in Niger, where at least 1 million people are vulnerable in coming months, as evidence of ongoing crisis.A third of Africans are under-nourished, Oxfam said, while the number of food emergencies has nearly tripled in 20 years.Nearly half of Africans live on less than a dollar a day.Conflicts cause more than half of food crises, Oxfam said, citing violence in north Uganda and Sudan’s Darfur region. -Nampa-Reuters