Sunday, February 12, 2012

Libya fallout worsens Sahel hunger pangs as crisis looms

Terra Daily via AFP: Sahel states are bracing for a long, potentially deadly hungry season, many weakened by the return of people from Libya who are unemployed, armed and creating fresh strife in already-vulnerable countries.

Crops have failed across a massive swathe of eight countries after late and erratic rains in 2011, and aid agencies have raised the alarm of a food crisis bigger than that which left millions hungry in 2010.

However this semi-arid belt running across Africa, separating Sahara from savannah, has had several new shocks which are aggravating the crisis.

As the rains dried up, so too did remittances from oil-rich Libya where many in this zone went to work, explains Grant Leaity, regional chief of emergency for the United Nations children's agency UNICEF....

Libya and the five other original founders of Community of Sahel-Saharan States (Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Chad, Sudan) as of 1998

No comments: