AEGiS-WSJ: U.N. Warns West to Act to Help Southern Africa Avoid Famine

Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2002. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.

U.N. Warns West to Act to Help Southern Africa Avoid Famine

Wall Street Journal - July 22, 2002
Michael M. Phillips, Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal

WASHINGTON -- Nearly 13 million people in southern Africa face imminent starvation unless the U.S. and other wealthy nations contribute more than $600 million in food, medicine and other emergency assistance over the next two months, the United Nations warned. Drought conditions have left six nations struggling to meet their food needs, but a bad situation has been turned into an impending disaster by the repressive policies of Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, the U.N. said.

The U.N. appeal seeks: * $285 million for Zimbabwe, which is by far the worst off with more than six million people at risk.

* $144 million for Malawi to help more than three million people.

* $71 million for Zambia to assist 2.3 million people.

* $44 million for Mozambique to aid 515,000.

* $41 million for Lesotho for close to half a million people.

* $19 million for Swaziland for 144,000 people.

$7 million for regional famine-fighting efforts.

"It is not inevitable that people should die in substantial numbers," said Ross Mountain, the U.N.'s assistant emergency-relief coordinator.

So far, donor nations have pledged roughly $170 million of the $611 million the U.N. says it needs by September if a famine is to be averted in Malawi, Mozambique, Lesotho, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe. The U.S. has pledged $98 million of that for food aid, and Mr. Mountain was in Washington to plead for more in meetings with the U.S. Agency for International Development and the National Security Council.

The brewing famine is the worst the region has seen since a drought 10 years ago threatened 18 million people, the U.N. said. But today's situation may prove even more disastrous. One difference, the U.N. said, is that now the working populations of the countries involved have been gutted by AIDS. In Zimbabwe, for instance, HIV infects 35% of pregnant women, and many households are now headed by children or grandparents.

Zimbabwe's government has pushed the region closer to the edge of catastrophe through policies that have devastated local food production and prevented private food aid from entering the country, the U.N. said.

Mr. Mugabe, who kept power through an election widely criticized as rigged, has distributed white-owned commercial farms among his supporters -- a politically popular but economically disastrous move in the view of the U.S., U.N., and other foreign entities. The government has barred food imports that don't go through official channels, the U.N. said.

The crisis "is very much complicated in the case of Zimbabwe by a number of policy decisions that have turned that country from one of the grain baskets of Africa into one of the basket cases of Africa," Mr. Mountain said.

Zimbabwe needs about half of the assistance the U.N. is requesting. Sign Chavbonga, press counselor at the Zimbabwean Embassy in Washington, said the food situation is serious, but denied that government policies have worsened the effects of the drought. He said World Food Program aid is starting to reach drought-stricken areas.

Write to Michael M. Phillips at michael.phillips@wsj.com

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