Appeal Target: US$ 32,084,145
Geneva, 6 April 2000
Dear Colleagues,
According to the World Food Program, more than 15 million people in Ethiopia, Eritrea, Somalia, Sudan, Kenya, Djibouti, Uganda, Burundi, Rwanda and Tanzania are facing a humanitarian crisis of serious proportions. The most seriously affected populations are agro-pastoralists in southern and eastern Ethiopia, Somalia and northern Kenya.
ACT members, the Ethiopian Orthodox Church (EOC), the Ethiopian Evangelical Church Mekane Yesus (EECMY) and the Lutheran World Federation/Department of World Service (LWF/DWS) Ethiopia, have said that more than 8 million people will require approximately 900,000 MT of relief food aid in order to avoid a famine.
This emergency has its roots in the failure of both the long as well as the short rains since 1998. The cumulative effect of consecutive droughts has thus had a disastrous impact on crop productions. Water sources have dried up, livestock and wildlife have perished by the thousands and people have been driven to the edge of survival with malnutrition and diseases already starting to take a toll of human lives.
There has been considerable media attention to the misallocation of resources due to the ongoing border conflict with Eritrea, which could have been far better used to address the needs of the famine victims.
The current crisis is being compared to the severe famine, which gripped the region in the mid-80s. There are fears that any further delays in humanitarian intervention will result in a huge catastrophe.
ACT members in Ethiopia, through the Joint Relief Partnership (JRP) proposes to cover roughly 10% of the needs enumerated in the Ethiopian government's Disaster Prevention and Preparedness Commission's (DPPC) Appeal of January 2000. Besides food aid, which is absolutely crucial at the moment, ACT members have also included in the Appeal an agriculture component comprising seeds, fertilizers farm tools, draft animals, pond excavation as well as provision of water and animal fodder.
ACT member, Danchurchaid (DCA) is again taking the lead in organising a food shipment to Ethiopia as they did in 1999, in connection with ACT Appeal AFET92. There was considerable support for the shipment from other members of the ACT network which we hope will occur once again and in a much larger way as the needs are far greater presently.
Support for a substantial ACT intervention has been expressed widely and several members of the ACT network have already made pledges to the Appeal. See budget for details.
The severity of the situation is evident from the proposed visit to Ethiopia next week by an ACT delegation, which includes Rev. Rudolf Hinz - Director LWF/World Service, Rev. Christian Balslev-Olesen - ACT Co-Moderator and Mr. Thor-Arne Prois, ACT Coordinator. A part of the delegation's brief is to ensure a coordinated and cohesive ACT response to this major emergency. A report on the findings will be prepared after the delegation's visit.
Please kindly send your contributions to the ACT bank account and inform this office of all pledges/contributions and transfers, including funds sent direct to the implementers. Please note the Pledge Form is no longer attached with the Appeal.
Account Number - 102539/0.01.061 (USD)
Account Name: ACT - Action by Churches Together
Banque Edouard Constant
Cours de Rive 11
Case postale 3754
1211 Genève 3
SWITZERLAND
Please keep this office informed of any applications submitted to the EU, USAID and/or to any other back donor for funding and the subsequent results. We thank you in advance for your kind cooperation.
ACT Web Site address: http://www.act-intl.org
Ms. Geneviève Jacques
<br>
Director
WCC/Cluster on Relations
Thor-Arne Prois
ACT Coordinator
Rev. Rudolf Hinz
Director
LWF/World Service
ACT is a worldwide network of churches and related agencies meeting human need through coordinated emergency response.
The ACT Coordinating Office is based with the World Council of Churches (WCC) and the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) in Switzerland.
I. REQUESTING ACT MEMBER
Lutheran World Federation/Department of World Service (LWF/DWS) Ethiopia, on behalf of itself as well as the Ethiopian Evangelical Church Mekane Yesus (EECMY) and the Ethiopian Orthodox Church (EOC/DICAC).
Other ACT members with a presence in Ethiopia supporting this proposal:
- DanChurchAid (DCA) Advisor seconded to the EECMY/LWS Joint Relief Office
- Bread for the world (BFW)
- Christian Aid (CA)
- Dutch Inter Church Aid (DIA)
- Norwegian Church Aid (NCA)
II. IMPLEMENTING AGENCIES
The 3 ACT Members, LWF/DWS, hereafter referred to as LWS, together with EECMY and EOC, will be responsible for the ACT program. These 3 ACT Members, along with the Catholic Relief Services and the Ethiopian Catholic Church constitute the Joint Relief Partnership (JRP).
The Joint Relief Partnership (JRP) is a consortium established by Ethiopia's churches and two church-related international non-governmental organizations (INGOs) in November 1984 as an emergency intervention measure during the peak of the Ethiopian famine in the mid-1980s. The JRP has maintained its operational capacity in order to provide emergency relief assistance to those vulnerable groups, which continue to be adversely affected by disasters, mainly droughts, which recur on a periodic basis. The JRP operates with the full support of international donor countries, as well as agencies and delegates from sister churches in the country and abroad, whose generous donations and cooperation has been instrumental to JRP's accomplishments.
On March 27th the entire group of ACT and JRP members in Ethiopia held a meeting in Addis Abeba and agreed on the immediate need for an ACT appeal to address the needs arising from the current crisis.
III. DESCRIPTION of the EMERGENCY SITUATION
Background
Once again, Ethiopia is in the virtual grip of a famine in which more than 8 million people are severely affected. To avoid a major humanitarian catastrophe, an estimated 900,000 MT of relief food aid is required in the next few months. The number of people affected is likely to increase as they run out of remaining coping mechanisms.
Besides Ethiopia, parts of Eritrea, Somalia and Kenya are experiencing grave food shortages and the total number of people affected is estimated at around 16 million. However, Ethiopia remains the hardest hit.
The UN agency, Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has said that "only a massive international effort in the coming months in support of the affected populations can avert further human suffering and loss of life".
The current crisis in Ethiopia has its roots in the failure of the belg1 and the meher2 rains in 1998, which resulted in a significant increase in the number of vulnerable people requiring food assistance in early 1999.
"As well as drought, armed conflicts were disrupting food production and distribution and driving people off the land", the FAO has said, highlighting the urgent need for peace and conflict prevention.
Rapid responses by ACT/JRP members, the Government and other relief agencies in mid-1999 however ensured that emergency food aid distributions were conducted in these drought-stricken areas, thus supporting traditional household coping mechanisms and minimizing mass population movements.
Current Situation
This precarious situation was further exacerbated in 1999 by another complete failure of the belg rains in many parts of the country, including North & South Wello, South Tigray, North Shoa, East & West Hararghe, North Omo, and Konso. This second belg failure prevented most farmers in these areas from planting the primary staple crops of maize and sorghum, which account for approximately 40% of total annual cereal production in Ethiopia. In response, many farmers attempted to cope with these unusual conditions by planting teff and pulses as substitute crops in the hope that the 1999 meher rains would come on time. Unfortunately, these rains once again came late and were inconsistent and erratic for most of the season. As a result, harvests were very poor in many areas for the second year in a row. To compound these problems, some areas received heavy bursts of rainfall, accompanied by hail-storms, floods and pest infestations, which caused additional crop damages.
Households have traditionally coped with drought-like conditions by selling household assets, such as livestock, to buy food. With the current drought having lasted for such an extended period of time however, thousands of households have already sold off all of their assets. In most of the pastoral areas in the south and east of the country, the drought dried up many of the water sources and created a shortage of fodder. For these reasons, a number of pastoralist communities had lost much of their livestock (mostly draught oxen, cattle, sheep and goats) by the end of 1999. These losses have severely compromised these households' ability to survive in 2000. Already, some communities in the Somali Region have abandoned their homes and livestock in order to migrate to other parts of the country, where there is a higher availability of food and water. According to monitoring missions, five children under the age of five years lose their lives every day in this region. Failure of the belg rains in 2000 will most likely result in the complete loss of all remaining livestock, followed by dramatic increases in child mortality and migration from the region unless emergency relief is provided in a quick and efficient manner. Health-wise, marked increases in both chronic and acute malnutrition rates are being reported in Konso and North Omo Zones of SNNPR, as well as in North Gondor, North Wello and South Wello of Amhara Region. Reduced water availability has also forced communities to rely increasingly on unsafe water sources, which has led to a corresponding increase in water-borne diseases such as dysentery. The one mitigating factor has been a slight decrease in the number of malaria cases, as mosquitoes which carry this disease have also dclined as a result of the drought.
IV. GOAL and OBJECTIVES
The goal is to assist communities who are affected by the current severe drought to survive and establish sustainable livelihoods.
Objectives
- Distribute food relief to families who have lost everything during the drought
- Provide live-saving nutritional food to severely malnourished children
- Assist victims in re-establishing food reserves through distribution of seeds, tools and livestock.
- Through distribution of food, prevent mass displacement of people.
1 Belg refers to the short rains, which normally occur from mid-February to mid-April in the agricultural areas of Ethiopia. Crops harvested after these rains have traditionally accounted for 5-10% of total national food production. [These rains are referred to as deyr in the pastoralist areas.]
2 Meher refers to the long rains, which normally occur from mid-June to mid-September in Ethiopia's agricultural areas. Crops dependent on these rains have traditionally accounted for 90-95% of total national food production. [These rains are referred to as gu in the pastoralist areas.]
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