Zimbabwe: Seven million need food aid as crisis deepens for children and families
Eighty per cent of the population in Zimbabwe now need emergency food aid, as the country's economy falls further into meltdown. The World Food Program (WFP) has upped its June 2008 figure from five million needing food as the Zimbabwean dollar becomes a laughing stock.
The country is also in the grips of a cholera outbreak, which has killed more than 3,000 people according to the World Health Organisation. "The economic situation has worsened more dramatically than we had anticipated," WFP regional spokesman Richard Lee told new agency AFP.
The food programme is now being forced to halve the cereal rations given to hungry Zimbabweans so that all the people in need can receive some aid. It is to cut the maize ration from 10kg to 5kg a month ¨C or just 600 calories a day ©¤less than enough to keep an adult alive. The recommended ration is 12kg a month. The reduction in rations would, Lee said, "unfortunately leave beneficiaries more prone to diseases" because of malnourishment.
The WFP says it has cut the ration to meet increased demand and cope with a shortfall in donations. It says it needs another $65m to keep feeding Zimbabweans until the end of March. But donors are wary of pouring more money into the beleaguered African state and what aid there is has been partly diverted to the cholera crisis that has claimed 3,000 lives.
Acting Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa announced yesterday Zimbabweans will be able to do business in other currencies, alongside the Zimbabwe dollar, in an effort to stem its world record hyperinflation. BBC southern Africa correspondent Peter Biles says the Zimbabwean dollar has become a laughing stock. A Z$100 trillion note was recently introduced. Even street sellers were refusing to accept Zimbabwean notes, a Harare resident told the BBC.
Zimbabwe's population is estimated at about 12 million, but the hyperinflation and a 94 per cent unemployment rate - according to United Nations figures, has turned more than three million people into economic migrants, leaving about nine.
SOS Children has three Children's Villages in the country and is working directly with families and communities to empower them to effectively protect and care for their children. The organisation has started community outreach programmes and medical centres which specialise in providing care for children and their families across Zimbabwe. SOS Children provides clothes, food, school fees, medical treatment, housing improvements and counselling, to more than 5000 children a year in Zimbabwe.
By Hayley Jarvis for SOS children
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