Dodma mute on hunger response
Nearly one month after President Lazarus Chakwera declared a State of Disaster to appeal for assistance, the Department of Disaster Management Affairs (Dodma) has kept under wraps progress on the response to date.
Dodma commissioner Charles Kalemba in an interview on Sunday said he could not divulge any details on how much money has been collected so far as the President will be officially launching the initiative tomorrow.
“The President will be launching a response plan on Tuesday. I cannot speak
now because I will be pre-empting what he intends to say to the nation,” he said.
The President on March 23 this year declared a State of Disaster in 23 of the country’s 28 districts affected by the El Nino weather phenomenon.
The districts are Nsanje, Chikwawa, Mulanje, Phalombe, Blanytre, Chiradzulu, Thyolo, Zomba, Mangochi, Balaka, Machinga, Mwanza, Neno, Salima, Mchinji, Dowa, Dedza, Lilongwe, Ntchisi, Ntcheu, Nkhotakota, Kasungu and Karonga.
According to Chakwera, the country needs 600 000 metric tonnes of maize valued at K357.6 billion for the humanitarian response.
He said a preliminary assessment showed that about two million farming households have been affected, with 749 113 hectares of maize affected, representing 44.3 percent of the national crop area.
Meanwhile, the World Bank has contributed $56.7 million (about K99.3 billion) to support Malawians affected by the food shortage that has hit the country.
In a statement, the bank said the funds were disbursed through the Catastrophe Deferred Drawdown Option (CAT-DDO1) as a response to the food shortage caused by adverse weather conditions.
Reads the statement in part:
“This CAT-DDO support comes in the context of the severe food crisis the country is suffering due to El Niño conditions in the wider southern Africa region.”
“Moreover, a series of intense disaster events over the last few years has left almost no time for the country to recover and has resulted in a severe erosion of food security at the national level.”
But the Bretton Woods institution has, however, warned that climate change-related events could surge poverty levels in the country and potentially push millions of people into poverty over the next 10 years.
It has since advised the Malawi Government to go beyond the Malawi 2063 development strategy in implementing climate change adaptation measures by among others, making the most of public resources and securing additional funds, especially from the private sector.
The bank said the Disaster Risk Management Act of 2023 could help Malawi shift from a response approach to preparedness, risk reduction and sustainable post-disaster recovery.
Further reads the s t a t e m e n t : “ S i n c e 2010 alone, Malawi has experienced 16 major flooding events, five storm-related disasters, and two severe droughts. In the near term [by 2030] climate change shocks to the economy are projected to reduce GDP [gross domestic product] by three to nine percent, growing to six to 20 percent in 2040 and eight to 16 percent by 2050 as the climate impacts intensify.”
Minister of Finance and Economic Planning Simplex Chithyola Banda yesterday welcomed the World Bank grant, describing it as a timely gesture that would help Malawi in mitigating the effects of food deficits.
He said: “This grant will significantly leverage the support from other development partners and well-wishers as we intensify the mobilisation of resources to respond to the food crisis.”
Malawi has negatively been impacted by the El- Nino weather pattern-induced dry spells that are projected to reduce food harvest.
The El Nino weather phenomenon also poses a threat to the achievement of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal SDG number two which aims at ending hunger and ensuring that everybody has easy access to basic, safe and nutritious foods by 2030.
