KENYA: Selling the cows to feed the children
 Photo: Mike Pflanz/IRIN  |
| Up to 50 percent of cows in some parts of northern kenya could die if the drought persists (file photo) |
"There is a lot of hunger; most pastoralists are selling their cattle at the market to buy other foodstuffs," Jane Sayena from Magadi, another town in Kajiado, said.
Four years of consecutive poor rains, experts say, have pushed communities in Kenya's eastern, northern and southern pastoral zones to the limit, finally forcing them to hurriedly sell off their herds for a pittance.
"It hurts to see the pastoralists selling their cows for as little at KSh500 [$6.50]," Sayena told IRIN. "Sometimes [they] cry... but it is better than seeing animals dying at home."
Livestock accounts for 80 percent of household income in some pastoral areas. Since the drought, the pastoralists have tried to cope by feeding their goats wet paper and slaughtering new-born calves to save lactating animals, but most animals have ended up in poor health.
Others tried to migrate to other areas, but the situation has grown worse. In northern Marsabit and Samburu, up to 20 percent of cattle and sheep have died - and the figure could rise to 50 percent if the drought continues, according to the Kenya Food Security Steering Group (KFSSG).
"If I sell even one cow, the children can at least get food," said John Ole Kopito, a pastoralist from Kajiado, which borders Tanzania to the southwest.
For a month, Ole Kopito has visited the livestock market every morning to try to sell a cow. None of the six cows he kept at a stall inside the market had sold during the month.
"It is costly keeping the cows here but I cannot take them back home as there is no grass," the father of six said. At the market, he pays to keep the cows fed and watered.
 Photo: Anthony Morland/IRIN  |
| A Turkana girl waters camels from a hole dug in a dry river bed near Kenya’s border with Uganda (file photo): Even camel milk production has gone down as the drought intensifies |
Kenya's pastoral regions have experienced rainfall deficits of up to 50 percent, the KFSSG said in a 20 August assessment. Even where some rains have fallen, environmental degradation due to charcoal burning, for example, has reduced the rate at which surface water sources recharge and pastures regenerate.
Overall, food security had been affected by poor pasture, deteriorating terms of trade, near total crop failure in agro-pastoral zones and acute water shortages.
In West Pokot along the Ugandan border, for example, six goats will buy only a 90kg bag of dry maize. Nationally, maize prices have doubled due to poor yields.
Pastoralists source more than half their food from the market, so they are very susceptible to market and climatic shocks. "The most likely scenario before the onset of the next season is worsening food insecurity in the pastoral areas," KFSSG warned.
Milk availability had also fallen and as a result, malnutrition levels have risen. Traditionally, production by the hardier camels would remain the main source, but even that has declined by up to 70 percent per day.
"We are being forced to skip lunch to have supper," said Joseph Ole Ntiyoine, a resident of Magadi. "We are also substituting ugali [a maize meal] for uji [maize porridge] to make ends meet... milk is now history in my house."
Ole Ntiyoine's herd has been reduced to 60 from 118. On a typical day, his family of four has black tea for breakfast and ugali mixed with cooking fat for lunch or supper.
Vouchers
According to Louise Finan, regional communications officer for Concern Worldwide, most people in drought-affected regions have to rely on food aid.
Concern is providing Plumpy’nut to severely malnourished children and supporting feeding sites for severely malnourished children and pregnant and lactating mothers, Finan told IRIN.
Working with local partners, it is also providing food vouchers in Kajiado, Marsabit and Moyale. Some 1,350 households will benefit in Moyale until December, along with 500 in Marsabit. Another 1,200 in Kajiado are waiting for a second round of vouchers.
The pastoralists are also being supported by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). Projects under the Emergency Response Fund have received funding for destocking and meat distribution in Isiolo and Marsabit.
According to KFSSG, sustained poor rains could undermine the very viability of pastoralist livelihoods, which have been hit by drought, migration, conflict and disease.
"People are stressed. Every time you go home, the cows have died, there's no food," Ole Ntiyoine said. "The cows are our [source of livelihood]... if the cows die, that is it."
Deti na pokraji smrti
KENYA: "Children are on the brink of death" in northeast
"I decided to migrate from Losuk [in Samburu District] to save the remaining livestock and my family, but they almost perished along the way," Joseph Lemanyan, a livestock keeper, said. "Most [of my livestock] died as we migrated. My youngest child, a girl, became ill and died on the way." Lemanyan's family is among hundreds to have moved south to the foothills of Mount Kenya, but there they lost more cattle because of the cold weather. "I arrived here [in August] with 42 [heads of] cattle... half of them have died due to cold here," said the father of five, who left Losuk after losing 64 heads of cattle within three months. The death of so many cattle has reduced the supply of milk, which should form a large part of the daily diet of children. "Children are on the brink of death... The numbers of malnourished children coming to our feeding centres is going up and up and we expect it to get worse," Catherine Fitzgibbon, Save the Children’s deputy director in Kenya, said on 22 September. "If we cannot get more food or cash to the region urgently to help families buy food, more children will die."
Most of the rural population in the areas where Save the Children is working is heavily dependent on relief food and many children are eating only one meal a day, of corn porridge. "This poor diet means they are missing out on vital nutrients, which can mean they grow up stunted and their brains and bodies can suffer permanent damage," the organization said. Since July, the number of severely malnourished children seeking treatment at its northeastern emergency feeding centres has increased by 25 percent. Molu Sora, the programme manager in the Marsabit Arid Lands Resource Management office, said livestock had also died across the rangelands stretching between Kenya and Ethiopia. "Animal carcasses are all over the place," he said. As a result, many families, mostly comprising women and children, are trekking long distances to save remaining livestock herds, said Francis Merinyi, a child rights activist with the ILAMAIYO community group in Laikipia. School attendance Merinyi said a survey conducted in Laikipia West District in August found that about 900 children had left school to join the migrating herds. More children had also been forced to work. Increased conflicts among pastoralists have also been reported. On 15 September, at least 400 Pokot raiders attacked Samburu manyattas (homesteads), killing 21 residents. Eleven raiders were also killed, according to the Kenya Red Cross. Observers say El Niño-related short rains, expected from mid-September to December, could either help or aggravate the situation. "The government and donors need to be aware of the changing climate now and in future, and shape their policies accordingly," Philippa Crosland-Taylor, head of Oxfam GB in Kenya, said in August. "Emergency aid is urgently needed now, but in the long term we need to rethink policies to focus on mitigating the risks of droughts before they occur, rather than rushing in food aid when it is too late." na-aw/mw | ||||
Theme(s): (IRIN) Children, (IRIN) Environment, (IRIN) Health & Nutrition, (IRIN) Natural Disasters [ENDS] | ||||
Faith Mukwanyaga, "Giving birth was like being circumcised all over again" | ||
| August 2009 (IRIN) | ||
"Circumcision was something I looked forward to, knowing it would mean I had become a woman at last. I knew that women who were not circumcised never got married and never earned the respect of the community - I saw them discriminated against by their peers, and I didn't want to be like them. "One day when I was nine years old, my family prepared a large amount of traditional brew and lots of women came to my house to cook a feast. I knew my circumcision was soon because my female relatives had been preparing me for the pain of the cut by pinching me in the days before. I and several other girls were then stripped naked and wrapped in blankets before being washed; the ladies sang for us as the circumciser cut the girls one by one - she used the same tool. "The pain was indescribable - my whole body hurt, I almost fainted. I bled so much that I had to have special herbs put on the wound to stop the bleeding. I then spent several days alone at home healing. One lady was assigned to me to wash me and feed me and ensure I healed properly. During the healing period, I was taught other things; I was prepared for sex and marriage. "When I got married, I found it difficult to enjoy sex; although I had a healthy sex drive, my husband found it very difficult to please me sexually, and I have always felt that something was missing from my sex life. "Giving birth was terrible. Each time I gave birth, the scarring from my circumcision meant I had severe vaginal tearing and bleeding, and I had to stay in the hospital for about a week after birth, when other women went home the same day they delivered. Giving birth was like being circumcised all over again. "I would never allow my girls to go through circumcision - the physical effects alone are a terrible and painful burden, but even the counselling I received after the cut [only] prepared me for marriage. My peers who were never circumcised all went on to complete school and have successful careers, but I had been told the most important thing in life is to be married and respected in the community; many of these women never married, but because of their careers they are respected. "Today I tell young girls about my own experience so that they can aspire to greater things than just marriage; they should seek education, not the pain and suffering of female circumcision." |
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