11 000 families get food aid in Lupane

ABOUT 11 000 families in Lupane are now receiving food aid to mitigate against the drought which has been declared a state of national disaster, the acting District Administrator, Mr Zacharia Jusa, has said.

In an interview in Lupane recently, Mr Jusa, who is also the chairman of the District Drought Relief Committee, said since(image) October last year the affected families have been benefiting from a cash transfer programme bankrolled by World Vision and Christian Care with Government's Department of Social Welfare taking care of the vulnerable who include the elderly.

Under the cash transfer programme each beneficiary is given $5 per month to use for the purchase of food. "This programme comes to an end in March but we want to appeal to these organisations to extend it by another six months as it is clear that this season's crop is virtually a write-off and these beneficiaries will therefore continue needing assistance," he said.

Mr Jusa said from the experience of the 1992 drought they have discovered that during such crises access to food is the major problem and consequently have devised a strategy to counter the problem.

"We have areas stretching as far as 160 kilometres within the district from one end to another so we have decentralised Grain Marketing Board points to ensure that people have access to food and we have also encouraged other players like National Foods to do the same," he said.

"We realise that during such crisis periods there is a tendency by private players to review prices of mealie-meal for example upwards. That is why we have decentralised GMB and created a number of points in the district."

The decentralised GMB points include Lusulu, Gomoza, St Paul's, Gwayi, Jotsholo, Mathambo and St Luke's.

"You also realise that it's not only maize which people need but other commodities that people require like salt and cooking oil," said Mr Jusa. "So we encourage even savings and lending co-operatives in the district to act as stockists of these commodities in their areas to improve access to food."

He said apart from ensuring food is available to people in the district, the drought relief committee was also looking at the condition of livestock in Lupane in the face of the El-Nino induced drought.

"We advise farmers not to wait until their livestock like cattle for instance have deteriorated to an extent that they end up being sold for as little as $100 per beast instead of say $500," said Mr Jusa. "The farmer would rather sell one or two animals and use part of the money to buy food and the rest feed for other animals. We also encourage them to keep goats as they are browsers and have better drought resilience and multiply faster."

As for the availability of water for both humans and animals, the acting District Administrator said Lupane was "not out-rightly dry". He said they were now encouraging the building of water troughs for animals to drink from at every point where there is a borehole.

"We are also exploring the concept of getting water through sand abstraction which organisations like World Vision in some parts of the district are pursuing," said Mr Jusa.