Somalia
It is easy to see food prices rising in our own country and think of the difficulties it is creating for our own citizens, but the situation is much worse elsewhere, where prices are rising.
please read the whole thing and keep the people of Somalia in your prayers: Conditions Deteriorate in Somalia, Threaten Humanitarian Crisis
paragraphs that struck me:
"The already poor state of the nutrition, health and food security situations is being threatened by prolonged drought, local currency devaluation (100% in one year), and the rise of basic food costs (in 6 months: + 115% for rice, +52% for wheat flour, +32% for sugar). This is threatening the already critical economic and livelihood status of the population. One of the population’s last coping mechanisms to get some cash to buy food or water is to reduce its already limited assets. In the Bakool region, where ACF intervenes, the last harvest was poor. As a consequence the stocks have been exhausted or sold and are now empty until the next expected harvest due sometime in July-August. Meanwhile, the latest nutritional survey carried out by ACF in the area in April of 2008 established very serious rates of malnutrition, with more than 22% of GAM and more than 2% of SAM among children under 5. These numbers seriously surpass critical internationally recognized benchmarks. "
"To make maters worse, the security situation has drastically deteriorated since early 2007 due to the expansion of the conflict all over South-Central Somalia. Somalia has disintegrated into a patchwork of countless armed groups and factions with various different agendas. Numerous civilian casualties, the displacement of thousands of people, the disruption of their livelihoods, and uncontrolled taxation at checkpoints, are some of the many grave consequences of such severe insecurity. "
from: Action Against Hunger press release May 27, 2008
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