Food crisis in Niger

11 million people could face hunger this year

 

Insufficient rain, coupled with an increase of locusts preying on crops, has devastated Niger’s food supply. Harvest has been only a third of what it should be in a normal year. This food crisis threatens to affect millions of people. We need to act on these early warnings before children start to die. Families in the worst hit areas are already struggling with around one third less food and money than is necessary to survive. One third of the population of Niger - over 5 million people - are already facing hunger. And with looming crop shortages and rising food prices, that number could double unless we take action now. Save the Children is scaling up as fast as we can but we have limited funds. We have already reached over half a million vulnerable children and adults with food and livelihoods support, and have stopped them falling into crisis. But we need to reach many more. Donate to our Children’s Emergency Fund today.

Photo by Tugela Ridley.

 

Emergency Response

Save the Children is already reaching 500,000 children:

• We’re supporting over 250,000 people, helping to buy essential food, water and medicine, as well as distributing livestock and training in farming methods. This creates a ‘safety net’ to stop families from falling into crisis.
• We support over 260 health posts in three regions, enabling hundreds of thousands of children, pregnant women and new mothers to access free healthcare. We have assisted in the renovation of health facilities, and provided medicines and healthworker salaries, helping over 500,000 children and over 200,000 women.
• We work with local authorities to support malnourished children, including 50 health centres and five stabilization centres for severely malnourished children.
• We’ve trained over 1,000 community volunteers to identify and refer cases of malnutrition. So far these volunteers have reached nearly 80,000 people.

We need to reach more families as quickly as possible. We are planning to reach 2 million of the most vulnerable children and adults in 2012 with food security and livelihoods support as well as health and nutrition programs.

Donate to our Children’s Emergency Fund today.

Longer-term planning

 

Niger is vulnerable to the effects of climate-change and we need to plan for long-term needs that will result from this. These needs must be addressed in order to break this cycle of drought and hunger. Save the Children is already developing a program of activities to reduce the effects of disaster through creating ‘special reserves’ of farmland and wetland but we need the funds to be able to do more. Save the Children is working to improve long-term access to healthcare and clean water, and helping farmers to adapt to the changing climate.

How you can help

 

Donate to our Children’s Emergency Fund today.