Heather Hill, public information officer for the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) in Johannesburg, where the food distribution logistics are grinding into action, said donors were responding slowly to an appeal in July for $507-million to feed the 10,2-million people at risk in six Southern African countries.
“So far we have raised only 24% of that, about $126-million. The appeal is for enough food to feed starving people until the next harvest in March. We buy mostly maize and this year we have bought 100 000 tons of maize in South Africa,” said Hill.
South Africa was expected to harvest about eight million tons of maize this year.
Most of the emergency food will be imported from the United States, which mixes genetically modified (GM) grain with conventional maize.
Zambia is the only country in need to have refused to accept GM maize. Hill said food distribution had not yet begun in Zambia because discussions were still under way with the government about its resistance to GM food.
The Norwegian government, through the Norwegian Red Cross, has donated 250 all- terrain former US army trucks for use in the emergency. The trucks arrived in Durban a fortnight ago and are being sent by rail to Lesotho, Zambia, Malawi and Zimbabwe. They will transport WFP food to distribution points.
A similar food emergency in eastern and central Africa is also proving difficult to combat. The WFP says more than 10-million people are facing a food crisis in Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Congo (Brazzaville), Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Sudan and Uganda because of drought and war.
WFP spokesperson Christiana Berthiaume said the organisation had received less than half of what it needs.