“If the rains don’t come, none of us will survive.”
Farhia, a 25-year-old Somali pastoralist, has moved four times in the last four months trying to follow expected rains which, on each occasion, failed to arrive. She is not alone.
Oxfam is now warning the drought in East Africa, where nearly 11 million people are already affected by food shortages, is threatening to become a humanitarian “catastrophe”.
Issuing a “desperate” appeal for the international community to meet a request from the United Nations for about £1.5bn of aid, the charity also said the worst drought in living memory demonstrated why the world must act to reduce global warming.
t pointed to several scientific studies which found evidence that climate change was likely driving up temperatures and making the situation significantly worse.
“Nearly 11 million people in Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia are dangerously hungry and in need of humanitarian assistance,” Oxfam said in a briefing.
“The worst drought-affected areas in Somalia are on the brink of famine.
“The crisis could deteriorate significantly over the coming weeks, as rainfall in March and early April was very low in places and poor rainfall is forecast for April through June, which is the end of the rainy season.
“Climate change is not a distant, future threat: it is helping fuel this emerging catastrophe in which poverty, chronic malnutrition, weak governance, conflict, drought and climate change have combined to create a perfect storm.”
In a grim irony, the developing world is expected to be hardest hit by climate change – caused by fossil fuel emissions that have helped make the developed world rich.
As the likes of Donald Trump and former UK Chancellor Nigel Lawson argue against cutting greenhouse gas emissions, people in places like Somalia are facing death from starvation.
“While some still deny the severity of climate change and question the need to combat it, others are struggling for their lives as climate change makes a bad situation worse,” Oxfam said.
“There could be no stronger call to take action on climate change than suffering on this scale.
“Governments across the region and around the world need to step up, take responsibility, and provide humanitarian assistance to save lives now.
“Without global efforts to reduce emissions and to help the world’s poorest people cope with the effects of climate change, this crisis will continue to repeat itself.”
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