Women and children go hungry in Guatemala food crisis

Thousands of families living in Guatemala are in a desperate situation as the global downturn triggers serious food shortages. Some 54,000 families living in the east of the central American are already going hungry, while 400,000 others are at risk of running out of food. Already 50 children have died of chronic malnutrition this year, according to the United Nations children's fund, UNICEF. President Alvaro Colom last week declared a "state of public calamity" to try to mobilise funding to tackle severe food shortages in the country.

About half of Guatemala's 13.3 million population lives in poverty and depends on money migrant workers living abroad send home to relatives, to make ends meet and to pay for basic groceries. But as thousands of migrants working in the United States have lost their jobs because of the global economic crisis, it has become even harder for their families to buy food. And with severe droughts wiping out harvests across the country, food prices have soared. The tell tale signs of hunger are appearing in hospitals across the country which are seeing more children with bloated bellies, hair loss, and skin infections. "Women and children have been caught in the vortex of this hunger crisis and are in a desperate struggle for survival," United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) executive director Josette Sheeran said in a media statement.

Lida Escobar, works for the WFP in Guatemala and has visited some of the worst-hit parts of the country. She told the BBC: “In the eastern city of Jalapa I was astonished by what I saw. There were many children with severe malnutrition problems. “We found 22 children with nutrient deficiency diseases in the hospital. “In Jalapa, the children are not only suffering from malnutrition but they also have to fight other diseases like bronchial pneumonia, gastrointestinal problems and diarrhoea. “They lose their appetites and their bodies don't absorb the nutrients when they eat. As their body defences are low, they get sick very easily,” she said.

The WFP is sending nutritional biscuits and other foods and the Guatemalan government has earmarked $7.5 million to ease the crisis. But WFP says there is only enough money to provide food aid to tens of thousands of families until the end of this month. "It's serious,” Adriano Gonzalez, Guatemala country representative for UNICEF told Reuters news service. “Children are already dying and many more are at risk of dying of hunger if the drought continues and the next harvest due in October fails too. There's not enough rain at the moment to guarantee the next harvest."