The agencies—CARE, International Rescue Committee, Oxfam International, and World Vision—joined together to express alarm at the rising violence and deteriorating humanitarian access since the signing of the Darfur Peace Agreement on May 5. They warned the increasing insecurity is crippling their ability to reach people in need, with potentially disastrous consequences.
Besides the eight deaths, July saw many other aid workers attacked and intimidated, and there were more than 20 incidents of humanitarian vehicles being hijacked or stolen.
“The targeting of humanitarian workers is completely unacceptable,” said Paul Smith-Lomas, the regional director for Oxfam, one of several organizations to have a staff member killed in recent weeks. “Since the signing of the agreement, Darfur has become increasingly tense and violent, which has led to the tragic deaths of far too many civilians and aid workers. A full and comprehensive ceasefire must be implemented immediately.”
Tensions within many of the camps for the region’s two million displaced people have risen steadily due to opposition to the Darfur Peace Agreement (DPA). Violence is increasingly quick to break out, putting at risk aid workers who are delivering vital services. Meanwhile, the under-resourced and poorly supported African Union police and troops who are supposed to be providing security appear to have reduced the scope of their efforts to protect civilians since the DPA’s signing.
The four aid agencies called upon those responsible for protecting civilians and creating a secure environment for humanitarian workers, particularly the African Union, to prioritize having a presence around the clock and regular patrols in areas around the camps.
The humanitarian response in Darfur is the largest in the world and has managed to stabilize the horrific health and nutritional conditions that were seen in the early stages of the conflict. However, the agencies warned this response is now under threat. Some areas of Darfur are seeing levels of malnutrition once again on the rise and outbreaks of acute diarrhea in the vast camps.
“The danger is clear. If we cannot access the people who need assistance then the humanitarian situation is going to rapidly deteriorate,” said Kurt Tjossem, a spokesperson for the International Rescue Committee. “ As usual in Darfur, civilians are the ones to suffer, from being attacked, displaced, and also from being denied access to the assistance that they urgently need.”
In the last month, more than 25,000 people have fled their homes in North Darfur in the face of fighting and attacks on their villages. Three and a half million people throughout Darfur are dependent on humanitarian aid, yet vast areas such as the Jebel Marra mountains and virtually the entire northwestern region are almost completely inaccessible to aid agencies due to the violence and insecurity. Recent fighting has forced many agencies operating in and around Kutum in North Darfur to temporarily suspend their programs.
The agencies called on all parties engaged in the conflict—those who have signed the DPA and those who have not—to immediately adhere to the ceasefire and allow humanitarian operations unhindered access to the people in need. They urged the international community to do more to pressure all sides to end the ongoing violence.
]]>The people of Seke Communal Lands, like most residents of Zimbabwe and neighboring countries, are growing desperate. People scavenge for leftover food at the local boarding schools. Among the most vulnerable are the approximately 1,500 orphans and families living in Seke whose members have HIV/AIDS. (According to UNAIDS, one in four adults in Zimbabwe is said to be infected with the virus.)
In urban centers, lines for ground corn at supermarkets wind their way around whole blocks and people often wait several days before getting any corn. Although there are no reports of mass starvation yet, there have been several cases of individual deaths from starvation. It only may be a matter of time before the numbers swell. The cases of malnutrition among children under 5-years-old have risen sharply in recent months.
Children in rural schools have fainted in class after going for days without food. No one has the strength to participate in sporting activities, so many have been canceled.
April is normally harvest time in Zimbabwe, but it means little to most peasant farmers this year. Their crops barely appeared before wilting and shriveling in a land without rain for many months.
This year's drought comes hard on the heels of last year's poor harvest, when drought was followed by torrential rains that carried away topsoil. The harvest was thin then, and no additional crops are expected until April 2003.
In normal times, Zimbabwe consumes 2 million tons of corn a year. The drought this year, described as the worst in 50 years by local farmers, has reduced that amount to only 750,000 tons. The country used to export grain and their harvests were very successful. Now, inflation is at 113 percent and the government will have to depend on foreign aid to buy food imports.
To compound the problems, Zimbabwe is bereft of friends in the international community who might come to its aid. The current food crisis is largely considered self-inflicted because the government's land reform program has severely disrupted production on commercial farms. Some districts report that the government is refusing aid to members of the political opposition who challenged President Mugabe in recent elections.
Aid agencies have begun to bring in food under the World Food Program (WFP), but so far they cannot cope with the crisis. To date, the U.S. Government (USG) has provided more than $49.5 million in emergency humanitarian assistance. In past droughts in Zimbabwe, only the most vulnerable needed assistance because there were enough grain reserves for the rest. Today, there is little or no maize meal available, even for those with the money to pay for it.
A large and highly effective Oxfam partner, the Association of Women's Clubs (AWC), recently began an assessment of people's food needs, particularly of vulnerable women and children. The AWC has more than 60,000 members around the country. They have put in an initial request for 6,000 tons of maize to supplement the diets of their members' communities until October 2002. Additional funding is essential to provide food after October for what is expected to be a far larger portion of the population in need.
To arrest the crisis this year, seeds and fertilizers must also be distributed before the next planting season in October. Without these seeds, there will be no crop next April either, and the people will continue to be dependent on external aid.
Zimbabwe's food crisis could well turn into a major humanitarian disaster without international support and a willingness to separate the needs of the people from the political problems dogging the nation. Despite the government's "anti-imperialism" rhetoric, it faces a crisis of a magnitude that can only be solved through international solidarity. The current stand-off between the government of Zimbabwe and international donors should not be allowed to prevent the provision of food assistance, as it is the ordinary people who are bearing the brunt of the crisis.
]]>In addition to the five million Zimbabweans relying on food handouts, around one million hungry people who would benefit from receiving food aid this month may not receive any at all because of insufficient funding.
Despite recent donations, the UN World Food Program still faces a shortfall of around $65 million for its operations in Zimbabwe until the end of March.
?We urge rich governments around the world to increase their aid to the UN emergency food appeal so that people won?t have to go without meals,? said Peter Mutoredzanwa, Oxfam?s country Director in Zimbabwe. ?Peoples? lives are in danger because of the lack of food. They are severely weakened and therefore less able to deal with cholera, which has spread across the country, or fight HIV/AIDS.
?I?ve met people who?ve gone for days without meals,? said Mutoredzanwa. ?Others told me they were eating wild fruit or vegetables. In cholera treatment centers, patients weren?t receiving any regular food either from health officials or their families, slowing their ability to recover quickly.
?The likelihood is that this year?s harvest will be even worse than last year?s and that food shortages could continue into 2010. As well as dealing with immediate needs, aid donors have to look at longer-term inputs to help farmers and prevent future food emergencies and food insecurity. This can be done through providing seeds for winter cropping, helping farmers to access fertilizers, and investing more in agriculture,? said Mutoredzanwa.
This week, Oxfam began distributing its monthly food aid to vulnerable families, working with the UN World Food Program. Oxfam is helping to feed more than 253,000 people in three districts of Midlands province, in central Zimbabwe, some of the most food insecure areas in the country.
People are set to receive rations this month of 10kgs of cereal and 1kgs of pulses—down from October levels of 12kgs of cereal and 1.28 kgs of pulses. Rations of cooking oil have been cut from last month?s figure of 0.6 liters to just 0.45 liters and there will be no distributions of corn soya beans. In addition, the numbers receiving food aid will be capped to a maximum of six people per household.
Desperate families have begun selling household assets and livestock to purchase basic food staples. A recent survey by the WFP found that nearly one in five households—including those receiving food aid—had sold assets in the past three months and that more than seventy per cent of households did so in order to buy food. Without livestock and valuables, families are even more vulnerable to future crises.
The study also revealed that 12% of households reported not having eaten any food in the previous day.
Zimbabwe has a shortage of seeds and fertilizers and most farmers can?t afford to buy agricultural inputs which are now only sold in foreign, rather than Zimbabwean currency.
]]>A toxic cocktail of factors, including successive droughts, violent conflict and chronic poverty, has put an estimated 9 to 13 million people in urgent need of humanitarian assistance. This situation has been compounded by rapidly rising food prices.
Oxfam’s Rob McNeil, who has just returned from the Somali and Afar regions of Ethiopia said: “This is a catastrophe in the making; we have time to act before it becomes a reality. The cost of food has escalated by up to 500 per cent in some places, leaving people who have suffered drought after drought in utter destitution. Some of the roads we travelled on were littered with dead livestock. There is little or no pasture or water for the animals that people rely upon. People are increasingly becoming desperate. I saw people in one village reduced to pounding the food pellets intended for their animals into porridge to feed their families. We fear that the worst could be yet to come as the crisis deteriorates across East Africa.”
In Somalia, the cost of imported rice increased by up to 350 percent between the beginning of 2007 and May 2008. In areas of Ethiopia, the price of wheat has more than doubled over a six-month period and food prices are expected to remain prohibitively high for many until the next harvest in October.
In the areas of East Africa heavily dependent on food imports, such as Somalia, global food price rises are making food more expensive. Local factors including poor harvests, market disruption due to insecurity and the rising cost of fuel globally have also played a role.
Besides a succession of poor rains, drought, high food prices, violent insecurity and chronic poverty, the region has been hit by pests and disease. An infestation of voracious caterpillars has damaged almost 70 per cent of crops and pasture in four northern districts of Kenya. Northern Kenya and Uganda have also suffered from an attack of a virus that causes high death rates of goats and sheep.
The impact of all these compounding problems is increasing destitution and misery for an already beleaguered population. This is the second serious drought in the region in the last three years and the human toll of the crisis is huge:
• In Somalia, 2.6 million, some 35 percent of the population, require emergency assistance. This could increase to half the population of the country (3.5 million) by the end of 2008. Between 18-24 percent of children are acutely malnourished.
• In Ethiopia, the government estimates 4.6 million people are now in need of emergency food assistance. This has more than doubled from 2.2 million in need of help at the beginning of this year. Some 75,000 children are suffering from severe acute malnutrition in drought stricken areas according to the government.
• In Turkana, northern Kenya, an Oxfam survey showed that 25 percent of children are suffering from acute malnutrition, the highest in the country.
High malnutrition rates have been reported in several parts of Ethiopia and could increase without an immediate increase in humanitarian assistance. To address the worsening food crisis the Ethiopian government requires an additional $430 million.
Oxfam is calling on donors to increase aid levels to the region. A UN appeal for emergency aid for Somalia, one of the worst hit countries, has only received 37 percent of funding needs. The Ethiopian government estimates that only one-third of the funds necessary to manage the crisis have been received.
“The public must be asking why does this happen year after year. The answer is that the world consistently fails to adequately address the underlying causes of these crises. Chronic poverty in a world of gross inequality of wealth and opportunity lie at the heart of these cyclical crises. Both governments in the rich and poor world need to invest in a concerted action to tackle the underlying causes. We need to act to save lives in the short term but without investment in the long term as well then scenes of destitution will continue to haunt our shared conscience,” said Oxfam America president Raymond C. Offenheiser.
Besides responding to immediate needs Oxfam called on donors not to walk away from the region after the emergency phase has ended. Long-term investment in safety net schemes, agricultural development and building capacity of people to prepare for future disasters is needed to prevent the vicious cycle of food crises, which have plagued East Africa.
Across the region, Oxfam is currently reaching an estimated 500,000 people with water, food aid and cash programs. Oxfam is also helping people to protect and recover their livestock and their seeds for the coming planting season, and in the long term, to secure their livelihoods.
]]>Aid agency Oxfam International, which today launched its report ?Credibility Crunch?Food, Poverty and Climate Change?an agenda for rich country leaders? says the ministers? most urgent priority is to fill the US$30 billion hole in overseas aid. Failure to do this will cost five million lives, Oxfam says. G8 leaders promised at Gleneagles in 2005 to increase aid levels by US$50 billion by 2010.
The report is being launched as G8 finance ministers meet in Osaka on June 13-14 to discuss African development and the food crisis amongst other issues. Oxfam says that after years of broken promises, rich country governments must not hide from previous aid commitments if they are to meet the Millennium Development Goals and keep their credibility intact. Oxfam?s report author Max Lawson said:? Half-way towards the Millennium Development Goals deadline, instead of coasting to victory the world is staring at defeat.?
He said: ?These are the same ministers who spent more than a trillion dollars in six months to bail out their own banks, but they cannot find a fraction of that to save millions of lives. With an economic recession looming, they must not make the poor pay the price by reneging on their aid promises.?
?The finance ministers must propose ambitious aid increases into this summer?s G8 in order to keep their promises and meet the challenge of the current global crises, so that a better future for everyone can be secured.?
On the food crisis, G8 leaders must also commit financial assistance and ensure that all the money?including the US$6 billion pledged at the Rome summit last week?comes on top of existing aid commitments.
Oxfam points to a similar situation for climate change, where a lot of the money pledged to help poor communities cope with the effects of changing weather patterns is simply being taken from existing aid budgets or instead being made in loans.
?Poor countries face a triple injustice,? said Vicky Rateau, head of Oxfam International?s delegation for this year?s G8 in Japan. ?Not only do they have to pay the price for rich countries? pollution, but the little money available to help them is being diverted from already promised and much needed aid. Finally, the crowning injustice is that they are being asked to repay this money with interest.?
Oxfam proposes an agenda into the G8 this year that includes:
Vicky Rateau concluded: ?If no action is taken now to seriously reduce greenhouse gas emissions, not only will it be a clear step backward in the fight to combat global warming, but the impact on the world?s poorest may be devastating. It could erase all the progress made over the last decades to tackle poverty.?
]]>?Food is a vital source of nourishment, but there are so many here in the United States and around the world who face enormous challenges in simply putting food on the table,? said De Laurentiis. ?To a billion people around the world surviving on just a dollar a day, the question ?what are we going to eat tonight? becomes more about life and death, than about recipes.?
Forty percent of the people on the planet live in poverty, many of them spending upwards of 70 percent of their meager income on food, according to Oxfam.
?We welcome Giada De Laurentiis to this vital work, someone who deeply understands the importance of food in our lives,? said Raymond C. Offenheiser, president of Oxfam America. ?Poor people in the US and in developing countries are finding basic goods out of reach. Now more than ever, it?s crucial to raise awareness about the hunger that exists all around us and to change the policies that keep people from lifting themselves out of poverty. Giada is a wonderful Ambassador of this message.?
?In every nation on earth, people go to sleep hungry even though there?s enough food on this planet to feed every woman, man, and child,? said De Laurentiis. ?The struggle of poor people around the world has weighed on me heavily, especially now that I am a mother. I have joined Oxfam because it is global organization that works to find long-lasting solutions to poverty around the world.?
De Laurentiis is an Emmy Award winning celebrity chef who has hosted several successful series on Food Network, most notably ?Everyday Italian.? She will debut her next series for Food Network, ?Giada at Home? on Saturday, October 18th. Additionally, De Laurentiis is a regular contributor as a co-host on the ?Today Show.? De Laurentiis is currently on book tour for the launch of her fourth cookbook entitled ?Giada?s Kitchen,? which already ranked on the top of New York Times bestseller list in the first week of release. While on her month long book tour around the United States, De Laurentiis included Oxfam inserts in each book sold, drawing attention to the growing problem of rising food costs and the hunger crisis worldwide.
]]>"Congress should take up this legislation urgently because hundreds of millions of poor people facing skyrocketing food costs need help," said Raymond C. Offenheiser, president of Oxfam America. "The critical short-term funding this legislation addresses is needed, but just as important are longer-term investments to reduce the vulnerability of poor people to the kinds of food price shocks we've seen this year."
The Lugar-Casey Global Food Security Act would create a new food security emergency fund for rapid response to urgent problems. In addition, the bill would authorize substantial new funding to assist developing countries in improving their agricultural infrastructure, thus averting future crises and helping farmers in developing countries—many of them among the poorest people in the world. The bill specifies new investments in research and would encourage new education partnerships to promote agriculture research and development. Perhaps most important, the bill would require a government-wide strategy by creating a new position in the White House to oversee and coordinate action, while emphasizing the central role of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) in managing America?s strategy to address food insecurity.
"Congress is understandably concerned about the US financial crisis, but it cannot turn a blind eye to the millions of people who are at terrible risk of hunger and disease as a result of the food crisis," said Offenheiser. "Support to assist poor people is a bargain for the money. It provides taxpayers returns in the form of economic growth and political security."
The Lugar-Casey Global Food Security Act is an important step in the short-term and will help equip the US government to save lives and address the urgent global food crisis. But it cannot be a substitute for fundamental reform of American global development tools. The ultimate path to food security rests on effectively fighting global poverty and right now, the US foreign aid system is falling short on this fight. The next President and Congress must tackle fundamental reform of the law, strategy, structure and practice of US programs to fight global poverty.
]]>The agency called on all donors to respond generously to the worsening crisis as, according to the UN, the total aid effort is currently under-funded to the tune of $260m.
The revised numbers of those needing emergency assistance is likely to be a conservative estimate and does not include the 7.2 million Ethiopians so chronically poor that they receive cash or food aid from the government every year.
?Today?s figures, terrible as they are, show only half the picture. Over 13.5 million Ethiopians are in need of aid in order to survive. The number of those suffering severe hunger and destitution has spiralled. More can and must be done now to save lives and avert disaster,? said Oxfam?s country director, Waleed Rauf.
"Compared with the funds going to shore up the global financial system the aid needed to save lives in Ethiopia is a drop in the ocean. The events of recent weeks clearly demonstrate that ? with the right kind of political will and ambition - action is possible in the face of urgent needs. We need donors to demonstrate that same kind of urgency when responding to acute hunger and underlying vulnerabilities in places like Ethiopia," added Rauf.
Oxfam is particularly concerned about the situation for pastoralist communities in Afar and Somali regions. In northern areas the recent minor rains season was patchy and many people will remain dependent on aid until March next year when the next rains are expected. Further south, if the October/November rains are poor people there will have to hold out until next July.
Numbers in need of help in the Somali region has doubled to nearly two million people since June. Those in need also face huge problems due to loss of their livestock with an average loss of 60 percent of cattle, 50 percent of goats and 40 percent of camels.
In July the UN?s World Food Programme (WFP) had to reduce monthly cereal rations from 15kgs a person to 10kgs. WFP has only received one third of the funds it needs and has an immediate shortfall of 229,587 tonnes food for the next six months. The UN agency fears the impact of this will include increased malnutrition.
?A number of donor countries have already made substantial contributions to the humanitarian response in Ethiopia since the beginning of this year. This has helped to save people?s lives, but now that the needs are increasing all donors must provide additional money,? said Rauf.
]]>The report, Double Edged Prices, calls on all governments, donors, and agencies to learn lessons from the crisis, including the importance of investing in agriculture, reforming trade policy to help ensure greater food security, and designing social protection systems that protect the poorest.
?Declining investments in agriculture combined with a rush to liberalize agricultural markets in developing countries and continuation of trade-distorting agricultural policies in developed countries, have all contributed to today?s crisis,? said Raymond C. Offenheiser, president of Oxfam America. ?Alleviating the impact of current high prices involves addressing the chronic vulnerabilities that arise from decades of poorly designed trade, agriculture and social safety net policies. These are what lie at the root of the problem.?
Although prices may continue to fluctuate and fall somewhat, they will nevertheless remain high compared to recent trends, according to the report. The sharp rise in global food prices has pushed an estimated 119 million more people into hunger, bringing the global total of malnourished people close to a billion. Higher food prices mean people are eating less food or food of lower nutritional value. Children are being taken out of school and farmers, no longer able to afford to farm are being forced to migrate to cities to live in slums. Women are especially vulnerable because they rarely own land and have limited access to credit and other services, but bear much of the responsibility for feeding and caring for families.
?While many of us are directing our attention to the financial crisis, far less attention is being paid to the food price crisis, yet the two are inextricably linked,? said Offenheiser. ?More than $12 billion was pledged for the food crisis at an emergency meeting in Rome earlier this year, but little more than one billion dollars has been disbursed so far. As billions are being committed by governments around the world to deal with the financial crisis, commitments to address the food crisis must not be forgotten. We must not leave the poorest on the sidelines.?
Government policies, especially on agricultural investment, trade, the development of domestic markets and social safety nets for the poorest have affected the degree of vulnerability and associated impacts experienced in different countries. In Brazil, for example, well-targeted government agricultural policies have shielded small farmers and consumers from the harshest impacts. In Malawi, government subsidies have successfully boosted production levels in many areas, resulting in surpluses and a reversal of previous shortages.
?Countries that have invested in smallholder agriculture and social protection policies have proved to be more resilient to the crisis,? said Offenheiser. ?Conversely, countries that opened their markets too widely or too rapidly to food imports and failed to invest in their agricultural sectors have fared far worse.?
Trade agreements, such as the Central American- Dominican Republic Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) have forced developing countries to liberalize rapidly and extensively without providing adequate safeguard mechanisms to defend vulnerable sectors, leaving these countries extremely vulnerable to food price spikes. While US agricultural exports to these countries reached record levels, growth in the Central American agricultural sectors decelerated spelling increased poverty where agriculture accounts for as much as a quarter of GDP.
?The international community has failed to organize to respond effectively to this food crisis,? said Offenheiser. ?Developing countries are being bombarded with different initiatives and asked to produce multiple plans for different donors. We need to see one coordinated international response, led by the UN, which channels funds urgently to those in need and also sets the stage for longer-term reforms.?
]]>In a letter to Congressional leaders, Oxfam America president Raymond C. Offenheiser joined the leaders of humanitarian organizations Mercy Corps and the International Medical Corps to call for urgent action by the Congress to meet the historic challenge posed by skyrocketing food prices.
?Congress and the White House are negotiating a new Farm Bill that will spend as much as $300 billion over the next five years. The bill maintains significant farm subsidies which go overwhelmingly to the largest and wealthiest producers despite the fact that US farm income is at record levels,? said the letter signed by Offenheiser, Nancy Lindborg, president of Mercy Corps and Nancy Aossey, president of the International Medical Corps. ?Even a small redistribution of subsidies for wealthy US farmers could make a huge difference in reducing starvation in many parts of the world.?
Faced with a global hunger crisis, Congress has an important opportunity to provide desperately needed funding to help those facing starvation due to high food and energy prices and help head off a global humanitarian disaster, according to the organizations.
?We understand that this represents a major political challenge, but we believe that the dire circumstances warrant dramatic steps and demand leadership,? continued the letter. ?We also know that a humanitarian and development crisis may be averted if these urgent actions are taken.?
Late last week, President Bush called on Congress to provide an additional $770 million in assistance to help address the needs of millions of people in developing countries who face acute hunger and to help improve agriculture so they can feed themselves. But, at the same time, Congress was preparing to slash funding for the McGovern-Dole Program, which feeds school children in developing countries. Restoring funding for the McGovern-Dole Program and responding to the President?s request for added funding are essential. In addition, a simple change in our food aid policy to allow cash for local purchase of commodities also requested by the President would immediately increase the speed and efficiency of food aid programs, providing more food and assistance to people around the world.
?Almost half of all US food aid cost due to bureaucratic restrictions and high transportation costs?, says Offenheiser. ?In calling on the Congress to provide more assistance, the Bush administration has also asked the Congress to allow more flexibility in providing food resources to those in need when addressing food crises.?
If aid agencies were allowed to purchase food aid closer to where it is needed?rather than shipping it thousands of miles from the USA?food could get to more people faster according to Oxfam. This would also encourage local food production that can help avert future disasters.
?As we have witnessed in the past few weeks, high food prices are pushing many more people deeper into poverty. Hunger, poverty, and lack of economic opportunity in developing countries are a human tragedy, but they also have implications for America?s long-term security and prosperity,? said Offenheiser. ?Americans want to help people in need. Pandering to wealthy farmers and special interests at the expense of women and children who face malnutrition is not what Americans expect of their elected officials. There's still time for the Congress to demonstrate leadership in helping avert starvation and social unrest resulting from high food prices."
]]>Large parts of Afghanistan are facing crisis as a result of the cumulative effect of factors including the harsh winter, high food prices, drought, and increasing and spreading insecurity.
An Oxfam assessment in one of the worst affected provinces, Daikundi, shows that people may be facing the worst conditions in over 20 years—and similar conditions can be found in other provinces. As it is almost impossible to deliver aid to rural areas during the harsh Afghan winter, concerted action is needed now to avert the crisis.
?This is a race against time, the international community needs to respond quickly before winter when conditions deteriorate. The health of one million young children and half a million women is at serious risk due to malnutrition,? said Oxfam?s Head of Policy in Kabul, Matt Waldman.
"If the response is slow or insufficient, people could be forced to sell assets or leave their homes and villages, and there could be a further deterioration of stability. Infant, child and maternal mortality rates—already some of the world?s highest—could increase even further."
Oxfam calls on donor countries urgently to provide sufficient funding for the response, especially the emergency appeal for Afghanistan launched in July, and support measures to increase the humanitarian capacity of the UN in the country. Some countries such as the US, UK, and Canada, as well as the EC, have already committed funds, but many more have not.
In a letter to International Development ministers around the world Oxfam warns that this is a crucial time to support Afghanistan?s development and also calls for long-term measures to strengthen food security and reduce vulnerability to disasters; in particular:
Oxfam also believes that a range of measures are required to enhance aid effectiveness including full transparency, indicators and targets with monitoring of aid effectiveness, more effective coordination mechanisms, and greater equity in the distribution of aid.
In five provinces, including highly affected areas such as Badakhshan and Daikundi, Oxfam is assessing the impact of drought and price rises on people?s access to food and water and is planning an initial emergency response of USD 1.8 million. In Badakhshan, for example, Oxfam will assist with the rehabilitation of water supplies and provide cash to enable 17,500 people to improve their consumption of food and clean water.
Oxfam is also implementing longer-term rural programs, directly or through Afghan partners, in a total of 11 provinces. These aim to promote sustainable livelihoods including through the distribution of seeds and fertilizer, livestock, supporting grain banks and increasing people?s purchasing power through cash-for-work projects.
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