Somalia: UN declares end of famine, but crisis continues

Rome, 3 Feb. (AKI) - Somalia's famine has ended but drought in the Horn of Africa continues to pose a threat to the area, the United Nations said.

“Long-awaited rains coupled with substantial agricultural inputs and the humanitarian response deployed in the last six months are the main reasons for this improvement,” the Rome-based Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) new Director-General José Graziano da Silva said on Friday during a press conference in Nairobi following a visit to southern Somalia.

The UN during the summer sounded the alarm saying drought had created a humanitarian emergency creating thousands of internally displaced people in Somalia and sending thousands of more seeking assistance in neighbouring Kenya and Ethiopia.

A new report by FAO-managed Food Security and Nutrition Analysis Unit and USAID said the number of people in need of emergency humanitarian assistance in Somalia has dropped from 4 million to 2.34 million, 31 percent of the population. At the height of the crisis, 750,000 people were at risk of death.

“Long-awaited rains coupled with substantial agricultural inputs and the humanitarian response deployed in the last six months are the main reasons for this improvement,”da Silva told reporters..

“However, the crisis is not over. It can only be resolved with a combination of rains and continued, coordinated, long-term actions that build up the resilience of local populations and link relief with development.

“We can’t avoid droughts, but we can put measures in place to try to prevent them from becoming a famine. We have three months until the next rainy season,” he added.