UN agencies raise alarm for food relief in Ethiopia

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia, Jan 17, 2005 (PANA) — About 600,000 people in Afar
Region of eastern Ethiopia require immediate food relief
assistance, according to reports by UN and non-governmental
agencies operating in the drought-hit pastoral region.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)
here has said the food situation in Afar Region continues to
deteriorate.

While the regional government has declared an emergency, the
actual population requiring relief food assistance was put at
560,000.

Ethiopia’s Disaster Prevention and Preparedness Commission has
announced that it was moving 6,000 tonnes of food to the region.

The regional government has requested supplementary foods and
clothing assistance for 50,000 people displaced by the drought
and famine from three zones.

Meanwhile, Afar Pastoralist Development Association (APDA), which
recently completed an assessment of the situation in Teeru woreda
(district), has warned of pending human starvation and massive
livestock deaths from disease.

APDA estimates at least 20,000 people are at critical risk in the
woreda.

Pastoralist families that migrated to the highland areas of the
neighbouring Amhara Region in search of pasture face possible
tensions with local communities, according to OCHA.

Water tankering operations were underway in the most affected
areas but additional tankers are needed until the “sugum” (short)
rains start in March.