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Guatemala + 4 more

ACT Alliance Alert: Response to El Niño and La Niña caused hunger in Central America

Attachments

  1. Brief description of the emergency and impact

Central America is experiencing the worst drought in decades. Drought is affecting food security for a second consecutive year. More than 4.2 million people are food insecure, severe acute malnutrition in some areas is reported to be as high as 8% and need humanitarian assistance after suffering major losses due to prolonged drought conditions. Predictive models show that El Niño intensity is diminishing in Central America and the Caribbean. It will probably reach neutral conditions (neither El Niño or La Niña) by mid-2016.

However, this transition increases the risk of a late and irregular start of the first rainy season and higher temperatures in Central America. The combined effects may lead to delays in sowing staple crops (first) and lack of water for human and animal consumption. It is expected that along the dry corridor in Central America, poor households most affected by drought last year will be in Crisis Phase 3 (CIF), if they do not receive humanitarian assistance. In Guatemala, serious food insecurity has been reported in the lowest areas of the Temperate Western “Altiplano”, where heavy losses in staple crops throughout 2015 have caused the poorest households to be totally dependent on food purchases.

All models predict the weakening of El Niño by early summer 2016. The chance of La Niña increases during the late summer or early fall. This forecast is consistent with the historical tendency for La Niña to follow strong El Niño events.