The Ethiopian Drought

Humanitarian workers are increasingly concerned about overstretch, coupled with lack of resources due to the world reeling from successive and protracted crises.

“When people cross borders, the world is more interested,” says Hamidu Jalleh, working for the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Gode, Ethiopia. “Especially if they are fleeing conflict, it is a far more captivating issue. But the issue of internally displaced persons doesn’t ignite the same attention.”

 It’s estimated there are more than 696,000 displaced individuals at 456 sites throughout Ethiopia, according to IOM. A total of 58 internally displaced person (IDP) settlements in the Gode region are currently receiving assistance in the form of water trucking and food supplies, according to the government. But 222 sites containing nearly 400,000 displaced individuals were identified in a survey conducted by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) between Nov. and Dec. 2016. IOM’s most recent IDP numbers represent a doubling of displaced individuals and sites from an earlier survey conducted between Sept. and Oct. 2016. In January 2017 the Ethiopian government and humanitarian partners requested 948 million dollars to help 5.6 million drought-affected people, mainly in the southern and eastern parts of the country.

The majority have been forced to move by one of the worst droughts in living memory gripping the Horn of Africa. Livestock are the backbone of this region’s economy. Dryland specialists estimate that pastoralists in southern Ethiopia have lost in excess of 200 million dollars worth of cattle, sheep, goats, camels and equines. And the meat and milk from livestock are the life-support system of pastoralists. Iif as forecast the main spring rains prove sparse, livestock losses could easily double as rangeland resources—pasture and water—won’t regenerate to the required level to support livestock populations through to the short autumn rains. Yet even if resources can be found to cover the current crisis, the increasingly pressing issue remains of how to build capacity and prepare for the future.  It takes from 7 to 10 years for herders to rebuild flocks and herds according to research by the International Livestock Research Institute and the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

“People were surviving from what they could forage to eat or sell but now there is nothing left,” says a director of a humanitarian agency covering Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa