European Union to allocate over $40 million in new aid fund for drought-stricken Horn of Africa

[News_Editor]

European Union to allocate over $40 million in new aid fund for drought-stricken Horn of Africa

2011-07-27 21:58:26 GMT+7 (ICT)

BRUSSELS (BNO NEWS) -- The European Union (EU) on Wednesday announced that its Commission is making new aid funding available for famine and drought victims in the Horn of Africa worth €27.8 million ($40.4 million).

The Commission said it is making the immediate allocation to the new aid fund in addition to the €70 million ($101.6 million) already given to the region earlier this year, as humanitarian situation in the region continues to worsen.

The drought and the massive displacement of people in the Horn of Africa, in addition to high food prices and dwindling resources, have created the world's largest humanitarian crisis in recent history. Some 11 million vulnerable people are now affected, many of whom are in acute livelihood crisis.  

The European Commissioner for International Cooperation, Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Response, Kristalina Georgieva, recently returned from Kenya and Somalia.

In Somalia, Georgieva visited the Dadaab refugee camp where she met families driven from Somalia by decades of conflict and the worst drought in 60 years. She also traveled to Doolow in Somalia on Sunday where she met with internally displaced people and visited humanitarian aid projects.

In Kenya, the Commissioner met with the authorities in Nairobi and visited EU-funded projects in drought response and disaster risk reduction. "This unprecedented crisis in the Horn of Africa calls for an unprecedented response," said Georgieva. "This is why, on top of the new funding of €27.8 million ($40.4 million), I have started the process to mobilize another €60 million ($87.1 million) to alleviate the suffering of so many people. This will bring our response to nearly €158 million ($229.4 million)."

Georgieva emphasized that Europeans had responded generously to this crisis, but she noted that the situation is getting worse, especially in Somalia. In Dadaab, more than 400,000 people are living in refugee camps intended to hold only 90,000 people. Every day more than 3,000 Somalis are fleeing across their country's borders to seek food and security in Ethiopia and Kenya.

This new EU aid package will provide food and nutrition to the most vulnerable households in the region, and assistance will also be given to safeguard animal health and protect livestock in Kenya, Ethiopia, Somalia and Djibouti.

The Horn of Africa is facing a double emergency with the drought and the displacement of people: currently 800,000 people are refugees with half of them now concentrated at Dadaab. 1.5 million people have been internally displaced.

Last week, the United Nations declared a famine in the two regions of southern Bakool and Lower Shabelle in southern Somalia, where malnutrition rates surpass the 30 percent marker and deaths among children under the age of five exceed six per day in every 10,000 Somalis.

-- © BNO News All rights reserved 2011-07-27

[blazes]

$40 million!!!

What a joke, when you consider the billions used to bail out Greece or (to go back) the banks on Wall Street.

What a mad world we live in.....

[maidu]

How about some of the aid money devoted to growing drought resistant plants with commercial/nutritional possibilities. Currently, most farmers there do only animal farming. Farming animals is a water dependent endeavor and is harmful to the environment in other ways - and it's obviously not working for them. Here are some crops that might be sensible for that region: date palms, jojoba (valuable oil for cosmetics), aloe vera, agave (tequila), thornless opuntia (prickly pear), hemp, cactus fruit (pink fruit found in Thai markets), ......the list goes on.

[geriatrickid]

How about some of the aid money devoted to growing drought resistant plants with commercial/nutritional possibilities. Currently, most farmers there do only animal farming. Farming animals is a water dependent endeavor and is harmful to the environment in other ways - and it's obviously not working for them. Here are some crops that might be sensible for that region: date palms, jojoba (valuable oil for cosmetics), aloe vera, agave (tequila), thornless opuntia (prickly pear), hemp, cactus fruit (pink fruit found in Thai markets), ......the list goes on.

You are right, but it doesn't work. When nutritionists tried to ween Africans off their corn/maize dependency it failed. Corn has some of the lowest nutritional values, and yet Africans cling to this colonial leftover like gum to a shoe.

[mjnaus]

$40 million.... what a dam_n joke.... The article mentions some 11 million affected by this crisis, so it comes to some $3.5 per person... Didn't Greece (read the international banking cartel) just get their second bailout package worth some 150 billion euro approved last week? How about letting the corrupt banking establishment take a loss for a change and give some $$ to those who do need it?