Support for Malawi appeal urgently needed
New York, 14 September: With
the next planting season fast approaching, the United Nations Office for
the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) warned today of the need
urgently to increase support for the $88 million Flash Appeal for Malawi.
In Malawi alone, 4.2 million people
are in need of humanitarian assistance over the next six months. The
United Nations launched its Appeal just over two weeks ago, calling for
$51 million for food and nutritional assistance and $37 million for emergency
agricultural assistance to reinforce the Government's two-track approach
to relieve the chronic food insecurity that plagues the nation.
Against this appeal, some $13 million in cash and 30,000 metric tonnes of food have been pledged by United Kingdom, United States, Sweden, Luxembourg, and Ireland. While welcoming these pledges, the United Nations yet underscores the need for additional assistance to be immediately forthcoming.
"I am very glad to see some of the humanitarian community's most consistent donors have responded to the Appeal so promptly", said Jan Egeland, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator. "But there is still a long way to go. We need more contributions, especially from donors among the Asian, Latin American and Gulf states, in order to avert hunger and to promote sustainable recovery of livelihoods throughout the region. Otherwise we will find ourselves facing repeated emergencies in years to come."
Malawi's farmers will begin planting next year's crops in mid-October, meaning that the window for providing emergency agricultural support -- and thereby preventing a recurrence of the same crisis next year -- will soon close. With just over $7 million pledged for agricultural support specifically, an additional $29 million is needed to ensure that each of the one million small farming families targeted in the Appeal has access to the maize seed and fertilizer intended to ensure they can produce enough food to feed their families in 2006.
Moreover, Malawi is not the only country now facing a crisis. Throughout Southern Africa, many countries are confronting critical phases in their chronic food insecurity situation, including Lesotho, Mozambique, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Regionally, as many as 10 million people are likely to require food assistance in the coming months.