Nine deaths in Mozambique's torrential rains

AllAfrica.com via Agencia de Informacao de Mocambique: At least nine people died on Saturday morning when torrential rains struck the northern Mozambican port city of Nacala, according to a report on the independent television station, STV. The storm also swept away over 60 houses, mostly built of flimsy materials and severely damaged roads in the city.

The nine deaths were caused by lightning strikes, and by the collapse of a warehouse wall on top of adjacent houses. The collapse caused the deaths of five people from the same household. There were two survivors who are receiving medical care at the local health centre.

The clinical director of Nacala district hospital, Marciana Machatine, said that of the injured people who were taken to the hospital, one had died, but the others were recovering. “Their clinical state is stable”, she said, “but even so they must remain hospitalized for the time being”.

Machatine took the opportunity to urge Nacala households to cover their homes with zinc sheeting rather than with thatch to make them more resistant during storms. Most of the traditional houses in Nacala have walls made of mud bricks, and are covered with thatch. They are always in danger of collapse during heavy rains....

The beach in Nacala, Mozambique, shot by Stig Nygaard Stig Nygaard, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons 2.0 license

World Bank supports greater resilience to climate related hazards in Mozambique

AllAfrica.com via the World Bank: The World Bank Board of Executive Directors approved today an International Development Association (IDA) financing in the amount of US$50 million to support climate change related reforms agreed upon between the Government of Mozambique (GoM) and the World Bank under the Climate Change Development Policy Operation (DPO). This operation will improve the country's resilience to effects of climate change through the implementation of reforms across several sectors of the economy.

Extreme climate related events such as cyclones and floods have devastating effects on agriculture, electricity generation, mining, and transport and communications almost every year in Mozambique.

The country ranks third in Africa in terms of exposure to climate-related hazards and is the only country in Africa considered to be at high risk from each of the major climate hazards - droughts, floods and coastal cyclones. Economic losses average 1.1 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) annually, having cost US$1.75 billion between 1980 and 2003.

The country's GDP fell following the 2000 floods from a forecast of 7 percent to 1.5 percent and the 2013 floods in the Limpopo Valley alone inflicted damages to affected settlements and infrastructure in the order of US$135 million and losses in crops estimated at US$112 million.

The 2013 floods also resulted in at least 44 reported direct fatalities, 170,000 people evacuated in Gaza province alone, and a high prevalence of water-borne diseases and malaria amongst affected populations, most of whom were extremely poor. The floods severely damaged transport, irrigation, water supply, urban drainage, sanitation, and private assets, further disrupting private sector activities....

US Air Force photo of a flood in Mozambique in 2000

Gaza province in Mozambique developing "positively", despite floods

AllAfrica.com via Mozambique Information Agency: Mozambican President Armando Guebuza on Wednesday gave a positive assessment of the economic and political situation in the southern province of Gaza, despite the repeated floods in the Limpopo valley.

Speaking at a press conference marking the end of his working visit to Gaza province, as part o
f his “open and inclusive presidency”, Guebuza said that the agricultural sector in Gaza had shown most progress in its performance. “My impression is that Gaza province is continuing to develop, continuing to grow, both politically and economically”, he said, “even though it has faced disasters in the shape of floods”.

Despite the floods, he added, the persistence of the farmers ensured visible results of economic growth. Guebuza said that the Limpopo river is the key to the economic development of Gaza, but the province lacks the infrastructures which could control the waters of the Limpopo.

“We all know the causes of the difficulties with the Limpopo - climate change, but also the lack of facilities that could help control the waters, such as more dikes and also dams”, the President said....

Rain over the Limpopo River in Mozambique, US military photo

Mozambique's rainy season death toll stands at 30

AllAfrica.com via AIM: 30 people are known to have died and another 76 suffered injuries from the start of the current rainy season in October up until 31 March, according to preliminary data presented by the Mozambican government on Tuesday, at the end of a meeting of the Council of Ministers (Cabinet).

The deaths were mostly caused by the collapse of houses, lightning strikes, falling trees, and drowning, either by boats overturning or when people were swept away by swollen rivers.

Speaking to reporters, the government spokesperson, Deputy Justice Minister Alberto Nkutumula, said that the disasters resulting from the torrential rains affected a total of 7,711 households (about 40,000 people).

During this period, the storms destroyed 1,906 houses, mostly built of flimsy material and damaged a further 6,454. More than 8,000 houses were inundated, as well as seven health units and 17 places of worship,

...Nkutumula said the government has been taking measures to assist the people affected, providing them with relief goods, food, health care, and shelter kits....

Flood warning for Mozambique

Paul Fauvet in IOL News (South Africa): Torrential rains in southern Mozambique and South Africa on Tuesday and Wednesday have caused a major flood on the Incomati River in Mozambique. Briefing the Mozambican parliament on Thursday, the Minister of State Administration, Carmelita Namashulua, warned that the current flood was not far short of the enormous flood wave that struck the Incomati Valley in 2000.

At Ressano Garcia, on the border with South Africa, the river was measured at 10.4m on Wednesday morning – more than double the flood alert level of 5m. Namashulua said this was much higher than the last flood on the Incomati, in 2011, when the river reached 6.83m.

In 2000, the year of the worst floods in independent Mozambique’s history, the Incomati reached 10.56m. It is now just 17cm short of that record, and the authorities fear that, since more rain is forecast, the current flood could exceed the levels of 2000.

The Incomati takes a long and meandering path through southern Mozambique before it reaches the sea about 30km north of Maputo. It will take two or three days for the flood surge to travel that distance.

In about 48 hours, the flood would reach Manhica district, said Namashulua. When that happens, it would sweep across the country’s main north-south highway. That would, almost certainly, as with previous floods, cut all overland traffic between Maputo and the centre and north of the country....

US Air Force activity over a flooded Mozambique in 2000

Mozambique floods destroyed over 1,300 homes

AllAfrica.com: Last week's flooding in Namacurra and Maganja da Costa districts in the central Mozambican province of Zambezia destroyed 1,340 houses, the spokesperson for the Mozambican government, Deputy Foreign Minister Henrique Banze, told reporters on Tuesday.

Torrential rains caused the Licungo river to burst its banks, submerging over 7,000 hectares of crops, 6,500 of which are regarded as lost. The floods had inundated 5,000 houses, 450 classrooms and seven health units. Roads in the two districts had become impassable.

Taking the country as a whole, Banze said said that 5,000 families had been affected by heavy rains and flooding since the rainy season began in October.

He said the government is seriously concerned at outbreaks of cholera reported in Zambezia and the neighbouring province of Nampula. 43 cases had been diagnosed, but so far there were no deaths. “Civic education and water purification measures are being taken so that other people are not affected by the disease”, said Banze.

The government is continuing to monitor the situation, he added, and will take measures to ensure that the food and health needs of flood victims are met. The weather forecast for the next few days is continued rainfall throughout the country, but particularly in the central and northern provinces....

NASA image of 2010 flooding in Mozambique

Flooding displaces hundreds in Mozambique

AllAfrica.com via the Mozambique Information Agency : Heavy rains in the central Mozambican province of Zambezia have forced 110 families to leave their homes in the districts of Mocuba and Maganja da Costa, reports the daily newspaper “Noticias”.

According to Maria Luciano, the Zambezia provincial delegate of the country's relief agency, the National Disasters Management Institute (INGC), 80 of those families came from the town of Mocuba. The flood victims are being temporarily housed in premises owned by the publicly owned ports and rail company, CFM.

Luciano said that the other families, from Nante and Maganja da Costa, are being accommodated in a former rice processing factory.

Luciano told “Noticias” that the INGC's focus is on assessing the needs of the displaced families so that help can be provided. Special attention is being given to Maganja da Costa and Namacurra, where it is estimated that nine thousand people are at risk of being hit by flooding, in the valley of the Licungo river. She added that five boats were available for rescue operations.

The INGC has also dispatched a team to Furquia, in Namacurra district, where houses and farms have been flooded....

Cyclone heading for Mozambique's coast

AllAfrica.com via Agencia de Informacao de Mocambique: A tropical cyclone has formed in the Mozambique Channel, and is forecast to make its way towards the Mozambican coast over the next three days, bringing strong winds and torrential rain to the south of the country.

Cyclone Deliwe has moved down the western coast of Madagascar, picking up speed. According to the US navy's Joint Typhoon Warning Centre (JTWC), at 06.00 on Friday the cyclone was generating winds of 83 kilometres an hour, with gusts of over 100 kilometres an hour.

As it moves over open water, the storm is expected to gather strength. The forecast for Saturday morning is for winds of up to 120 kilometres an hour.

It is not yet clear whether Deliwe will strike the Mozambican coast, but the National Meteorology Institute (INAM) warns that it is heading towards Inhambane province. Thunderstorms and heavy rains can be expected in the southern part of the Mozambique Channel over the next four days.

The cyclone is moving west at a speed of 12 knots (22 kilometres an hour). It will create dangerous conditions at sea, with waves up to five metres high...

Loss and damage from climate change

Science Daily: An open access special issue of the International Journal of Global Warming brings together, for the first time, empirical evidence of loss and damage from the perspective of affected people in nine vulnerable countries. The articles in this special issue show how climatic stressors affect communities, what measures households take to prevent loss and damage, and what the consequences are when they are unable to adjust sufficiently. The guest-editors, Kees van der Geest and Koko Warner of the United Nations University Institute for Environment and Human Security (UNU-EHS) in Bonn, Germany, introduce the special issue with an overview of key findings from the nine research papers, all of which are available online free of charge.

'Loss and damage' refers to adverse effects of climate variability and climate change that occur despite mitigation and adaptation efforts. Warner and van der Geest discuss the loss and damage incurred by people at the local-level based on evidence from research teams working in nine vulnerable countries: Bangladesh, Bhutan, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, The Gambia, Kenya, Micronesia, Mozambique and Nepal. The research papers pool data from 3269 household surveys and more than 200 focus groups and expert interviews.

The research reveals four loss and damage pathways. Residual impacts of climate stressors occur when:

• existing coping/adaptation to biophysical impact is not enough;
• measures have costs (including non-economic) that cannot be regained;
• despite short-term merits, measures have negative effects in the longer term; or
• no measures are adopted -- or possible -- at all.

The articles in this special issue provide evidence that loss and damage happens simultaneously with efforts by people to adjust to climatic stressors. The evidence illustrates loss and damage around barriers and limits to adaptation: growing food and livelihood insecurity, unreliable water supplies, deteriorating human welfare and increasing manifestation of erosive coping measures (e.g. eating less, distress sale of productive assets to buy food, reducing the years of schooling for children, etc.). These negative impacts touch upon people's welfare and health, social cohesion, culture and identity -- values that contribute to the functioning of society but which elude monetary valuation....

Turner's 1805 painting, "The Shipwreck"

Flood-proofing Mozambique

IRIN: Mozambique has dealt with years of recurrent floods and set up an effective early warning system, yet the intensity of this year’s rains came as a surprise.  At least a 100 people have been killed and 150,000 displaced in the country’s southern Gaza Province, with the Chókwè District among the worst affected by flooding of the Limpopo River.

The numbers of people killed and displaced have dropped since 2000, when floods in Mozambique killed 700 people and displaced a quarter of a million others, but they are higher than the tolls from 2008’s floods.

Aid workers and officials in Mozambique are now discussing problems in the early warning system, and they are looking to long-term solutions, including reviving a long-standing debate on dams, to save people from future floodwaters.  Although 2008 saw floodwaters along the Zambezi River Valley reach levels higher than in past flood years, increased planning, early warning and the rapid response capacity of the National Institute for Disaster Management (INGC) ensured a better-coordinated response and lower casualties, according to the UN in Mozambique. 

But these measures proved less effective against this year’s torrential rains.  Américo Ubisse, the general secretary of the Mozambican Red Cross, has already started thinking about lessons learned. “The early warning system worked well this time. People already understand the meaning of blue, orange and red alert [colours signifying levels of risk]. But still the problem is that we were taken by surprise by the magnitude of the rains. The forecast talked about between 75 and 150mm of rain [over two days in the south]. But in the end [we received] 400mm. Suddenly, the water was already in the city and many people were affected at the same time.”

Sergio Buque at the National Meteorological Institute in Maputo says it is difficult to forecast rain quantities over 75mm using the equipment they have....

Preparedness pays as hundreds of thousands flee from floods in Mozambique

Alexander Matheou in the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies: Yvonne is 64. She has spent the last six days on a roof. The rest of her family fled the village ten days ago after packing everything they could onto a small cart, but Yvonne stayed, hoping the oncoming floods would recede quickly so she could salvage and protect her house and her things.  But the water flowed in and rose up fast. So she climbed onto the roof and waited.

When she felt the water was shallow enough, she climbed down and walked 25km to an agreed meeting point. As she arrives, the family gather round, cheering and clapping. Yvonne does a little dance and joins the six children and three adults huddled under a plastic sheet.

Scattered around her and stretching along miles of road are tens of thousands of other families, huddled under dense trees for shelter. A few have tents, some have plastic sheets, but most are out in the open. The majority are women and children. They are cooking, breastfeeding, fanning themselves, sleeping and braiding their children's hair. They have all managed to salvage something from their homes so they sit around piles of cases and bags.

That they have been able to save anything is testament to the one piece of good news in a crisis that has displaced 200,000 people. The early warning systems worked.

Improved climate science, combined with the commitment of the authorities to disseminate warnings through radio and volunteers with the Mozambique Red Cross Society, meant people had time to pack and leave for higher ground. During the floods of 2000, over 700 people died.  So far in 2013, fewer than 100 have lost their lives.

Yet while the early warning is impressive, the overall response is less so. In this one district of Gaza, 100,000 people are sleeping in the open, and there are also problems with food, water and hygiene. Relief is being distributed, but it is in painfully short supply. Roads are still crammed with moving people, and the numbers are swelling....

NASA image of a 2000 flood in Mozambique

Mozambique floods prompt humanitarian crisis

Terra Daily via AFP: Tens of thousands of Mozambicans are stranded without food and water after floods swept through the south of the country this week, sparking a large-scale humanitarian crisis.

With the displaced now living in the open and eating grasshoppers to survive, the Mozambican government and international agencies like the Red Cross are warning of a looming catastrophe.

When the floods came on Wednesday, residents of Chokwe town escaped the raging flow of the Limpopo River with what little they could carry.

Alegria Hlangwe only had time to grab one of her children. Her other two sons were across town....

Mozambique floods kill 2, destroy homes

Terra Daily via AFP: Floods in Mozambique have killed two people and left hundreds homeless after heavy rains caused havoc, cutting roads and inundating parts of the capital, authorities said Tuesday.

Heavy rains have caused five major rivers -- including the Zambezi, Africa's fourth longest river system -- to burst their banks, flooding farmland and destroying homes.

"At this moment our big worry is Inhambane (in southern Mozambique)... where we have 800 displaced people," a spokesperson for the National Disaster Management Agency told AFP. Authorities have set up emergency centres accommodating those who have lost their homes in the floods....

Climate-proofing roads

IRIN: Disaster reduction experts have been calling on countries to “climate-proof” infrastructure like roads, but until now, there have been no studies showing the scale or importance of these interventions.

A recent study by the Intergovernmental Group of Twenty-Four says developing countries will have to spend about US$200-300 billion per year by 2020 to construct public infrastructure - like bridges, power supplies and roads - that are not only environmentally friendly but can also withstand extreme changes in temperature and rainfall.

The study, co-authored by economist Nicholas Stern, says developing countries are spending $0.8-0.9 trillion per year on infrastructure, the majority of which is financed by domestic budgets. To keep up with population growth, cover existing gaps, and make infrastructure climate-resilient as well, countries will have to spend a total of $1.8-2.3 trillion per year by 2020.

A good road network, the basis of most infrastructures, is critical for the development of any country. Roads are essential to trade, transportation, and the provision of food, healthcare and education, promoting economic growth at every level.

Researchers from the Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, have joined hands with the United Nations University-World Institute for Development Economics Research (UNU-WIDER) to take a closer look at how climate change could affect roads in the developing world, using Mozambique as an example.  Food supply in Mozambique is already constrained by the lack of adequate roads linking the big commercial farms in the north to markets in the south. Climate change threatens what roads exist with frequent and intense flooding and high temperatures, researchers said....

A road in Mozambique, shot by Stig Nygaard, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license

How ecosystem based solutions are bearing fruit in Mozambique

Richard Munang in Responding to Climate Change:  Headlines of late have focused on the worst drought in decades in Africa and elsewhere. In response, the international prices of maize and soybeans have risen past 2007-08 peaks, when they fueled food riots in more than 30 countries. Over the next few decades Africa’s population [1] is expected to expand to more than that of China or India, constituting about 23% of the global population by 2050.

This will place a huge demand on governments and states to provide sufficient survival opportunities. It is therefore critical to build resilient food systems that can enhance food security and address other numerous challenges like climate change, resource scarcity and severe ecological degradation.

However, the questions as to the type of measures/approaches and strategies required still generate divergent views on the international policy arena. Closer attention to a broader spectrum of options is urgently needed. Approaches that go beyond words into actions with potential to informing and guiding policy practices are imperative and urgently needed.

One of these approaches is Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA) that has provided flexible, cost effective and broadly applicable alternatives for building robust food systems and reducing the impacts of climate change.

Ecosystem degradation undermines food production and the availability of clean water among other ecosystem services, thereby threatening human health, livelihoods and ultimately societal stability. Degradation increases the vulnerability of populations to natural disasters like the Horn of Africa droughts....

A beach in Xai Xai, Mozambique, shot by Erik Kristensen, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license

Mozambique's agricultural fortunes rest on a choice between Obama and Annan

Joseph Hanlon in the povertymatters blog at the Guardian (UK): Mozambique is a development paradox. Rural poverty is increasing despite high growth rates and billions of dollars in aid. Now the country has been targeted by two contrasting models of agricultural development. The Barack Obama model was backed by the G8 in Washington in May, while the Kofi Annan model was proposed by the Africa Progress Panel (APP). Which works better for the poor?

The APP, which is chaired by Annan and counts a former IMF head and a former US Treasury secretary among its members, is heavyweight and conservative. It says one of the biggest dangers in Africa is the growing inequality between rich and poor, which is creating a threat of social instability. In sub-Saharan Africa, the APP argues, "the pattern of trickle-down growth is leaving too many people in poverty". The panel warns that Mozambique is one of Africa's more unequal countries, pointing out that – despite having huge agricultural potential – the republic is a net importer of staple foods.

The APP report calls for "fundamental change" in both donor and African government policies. "Raising the productivity of smallholder farmers is critical," it says. "Smallholder agriculture must be placed at the centre of a green revolution in Africa." This will require more government action and more support for small farmers. Let's call this the Annan model.

The second agricultural model for Mozambique was agreed in Washington in May, when G8 leaders adopted a new alliance for food security and nutrition proposed by President Obama and USAid. The idea is to use giant agribusiness to end hunger in Mozambique and five other countries. The first project in Mozambique will be to support Cargill, the giant grain trader and largest private company in the world, to take 40,000 hectares of farmland. US officials say this will include some smallholder contract farming, which means Cargill will not make enough profit from the investment, so the giant transnational grain trader must be subsidised from G8 aid. Let's call this the Obama model.

The two models are incompatible. The APP report points specifically to the very large land concessions in Mozambique, and warns that "for Africans, the benefits of large-scale land acquisitions are questionable"....

Farmers in Mozambique, shot by Alan Meier, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

January floods mark the beginning of the disaster year

David Singh at the United National International Strategy for Disaster Reduction: Floods that began in January and which continue to heap misery on communities in Africa, the Americas, Australia and the Pacific, are a strong indication that over 100 million people will again be affected by floods this year in line with long-term trends.

“Widespread floods in January are in keeping with long-term disaster trends which show that floods are the most dominant disaster category when it comes to the numbers affected. Over the last ten years annual averages of 106 million people have had their lives disrupted by floods.

“The frequency and impact of the storms and floods last month should encourage local governments in coastal and riverside areas to put in place the budgeting and infrastructure necessary to reduce the impact of floods and prevent the significant loss of life and livelihoods which comes with them”, said UNISDR Head, Margareta Wahlström.

...Wahlström commented: ”In light of the evidence which points towards increased hydro-meteorological hazards, can we really continue to say that these events are unexpected or are we simply just unprepared? The most important thing right now is to find immediate strategies to deal with displaced people and long-term strategies to protect communities from these life threatening yet preventable situations.”...

A road in Red Wing, Minnesota is closed due to flooding in 2010. Photo by Patsy Lynch/FEMA

Farmers in Mozambique trying to adapt farming to climate change

Public Radio International: As the rain and water in Mozambique becomes less predictable and less suited to subsistence farming, aid groups and the local government are trying to help some change the way they farm so they're not so paralyzed by a flood or a drought. But there's a lot of work to do.

Over the past two decades, Mozambique has suffered more than its fair share of weather disasters. The east African nation has seen more devastating cyclones, droughts and floods than any country on the continent. Farmers in Mozambique have been particularly hard hit. This year alone, torrential rains in the mountains sent flood waters onto fields below, submerging tens of thousands of acres of crops.

And now, farmers are in the midst of another rainy season, which started in December. Officials at Mozambique’s National Institute for Disaster Management have to prepare for rescue operations this time of year. Figueredo de Araujo, the institute's information manager, said the emergency operations center is equipped with rescue boats as well as warehouses with various goods for humanitarian assistance: maize flour, tents, tarps, boots and rain coats among them.

Caia, where Mozambique’s main highway crosses the Zambezi river, sits in the middle of a vast, flat, floodplain that is home to nearly a million people. In 2000, the area was hit by the worst flooding in memory. The floods killed 700 people, displaced 100,000, and cost Mozambique a 1.5 percent loss in GDP through destruction of crops....

A Mozambique province prepares for floods

AllAfrica.com: Mozambique's relief agency, the National Disasters Management Institute (INGC) has reactivated all 84 Local Disaster Risk Management Committees in the central province of Sofala because of the possibility of serious flooding in the province, reports Wednesday's issue of the Maputo daily "Noticias".

The weather forecast for central Mozambique is for normal to above normal rainfall in the second half of the rainy season (January to March). The INGC delegate in Sofala, Luis Pacheco, warned that this could mean floods on the four major rivers that flow through Sofala - the Zambezi, the Pungoe, the Buzi and the Save.

He said that people living in the river valleys, and in the provincial capital, Beira, will be on flood alert and that over six million meticais (about 221,000 US dollars) will be spent on preventive activities. He added that Sofala has all the logistical equipment needed to face the heavy rains that are forecast.

If large scale flooding does occur, said Pacheco, the government will resort immediately to the more than 20 motor boats stationed at the INGC's Central Regional Directorate in Caia, on the south bank of the Zambezi. The boats will be used in search and rescue operations.

Beira is at risk because parts of the city are up to five metres below sea level. Currently the Beira drainage channels are being cleaned, and new Disaster Risk Management Committees have been set up in the city's suburbs....

A NASA image of a 2000 flood in Mozambique

FAO raises alert on high flooding risks in parts of southern Africa

FAO: Thousands of hectares of agricultural land and crops have been damaged by floods and heavy rains in parts of southern Africa, and more damage may occur in the coming weeks if above normal rains persist. This is raising concern about the food security of the affected population in the poorer parts of the sub-region over the coming months.

With the rainy season still only half way through, and with the cyclone season due to peak in February, several agricultural areas along the rivers in southern African countries remain at high risk of flooding, including portions of Botswana, Lesotho Mozambique, Namibia, Zambia, Zimbabwe and South Africa.

“Food insecurity levels are already critical in the affected areas of some of these countries and floods will only further worsen the ability of poor farmers to cope and feed their families in the coming months,” said Cindy Holleman, FAO Regional Emergency Coordinator for Southern Africa. FAO is working with regional and national early warning systems to monitor the evolution in major river basins and to assess the impact on food crops.

In Lesotho, for example, one of the poorest countries in the sub-region, an FAO assessment team found that in some of the flooded areas up to 60 percent of harvests have been lost and over 4 700 livestock, mainly sheep and goats are dead.

Localized crop losses are also reported along river banks in southern and central Mozambique. The government has declared a red alert for central and southern Mozambique as water flows in the major rivers are above alert levels.

South Africa has already declared a national state of disaster in many districts of the country due to the floods that have destroyed thousands of hectares of crop land, and caused damages estimated in the millions of dollars…

The Limpopo River flooded in Southern Mozambique in 2000