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OCHA has been in Ethiopia since 2001 with the aim of coordinating effective and principled humanitarian action. OCHA works on four core functions: alleviate human suffering in Ethiopia caused by drought; promotion of preparedness and prevention efforts to reduce future vulnerability to natural disasters; advocating for the rights of people in need; and facilitating sustainable solutions to address root causes.
  
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29 June 2009


HUMANITARIAN SITUATION UPDATE 

Preliminary Belg Assessment Findings

Preliminary findings  due to poor performance of the February toof the belg assessment teams indicate poor harvests in many belg crop-producing areas May rains. Major belg crop failure is reported in East and West Hararghe zones, while serious shortages of water and pasture are reported in the lowland areas of Oromiya Region. Full text

 

2009 Kiremt Season Outlook

According to the National Meteorological Agency (NMA) kiremt season climate outlook, the rains’ performance is expected to be normal to above normal in the central‐western and southwestern crop-producing parts of the country, but normal to below normal in northwestern, eastern, and central crop-producing areas, as well as the northeastern pastoral parts of the country. Full text

Continued Break in Relief Food Pipeline

WFP reports that breaks in its relief food pipeline continue. The stakeholder food prioritization committee is regularly meeting to decide on rations for upcoming distributions. According to WFP, only three months’ relief food allocations were distributed in the first half of the year. Meanwhile, WFP and the NGO Joint Emergency Operation Programme (JEOP) resources could jointly address the needs of 4.1 million beneficiaries in a fourth round of allocations, while WFP has planned to reach approximately 3 million people in the fifth round.  Full text

Influenza A H1N1 Cases in Ethiopia

The Federal Ministry of Health (FMoH) officially confirmed two cases of Influenza A H1N1 in Ethiopia on 19 June 2009. The cases were spotted at the airport where inspection points have been set up for detection and referral to selected hospitals.  Full text

AWD Update

According to official reports from the Somali Regional Health Bureau, 95 new cases of Acute Watery Diarrhoea (AWD) and 12 deaths have been reported in Afdem and Miesso woredas (Shinile Zone, Somali Region) in the last week. In Oromiya Region, five woredas are newly affected in West Arsi zone, two woredas in East Shoa and four in East Hararghe, while Konso woreda in SNNPR continues to report new cases. In Afar Region, Gawane, Buremudiaytu, Amebara, Elidaar and Assayita woredas have been affected. WHO and UNICEF continue to provide technical support to the affected regions through provision of emergency drug kits and technical support. In Afdem and Miesso, UNICEF is sending two CTC kits and 2,000 jerry cans of 20 litre capacity, in addition to the materials sent last week.  Full text

                                                                              

 

 

CONTENTS IN THIS ISSUE

 

    • SUMMARY OF THE 2009 HUMANITARIAN REQUIREMENTS DOCUMENT
    • SUMMARY OF DISASTER RISK MANAGEMENT
    • REGIONAL OVERVIEW
    • UPCOMING & ONGOING MEETINGS

  

Humanitarian Requirements Document 30 January, 2009

 

 

 

 

 

 
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ETHIOPIA: Erratic rainfall threatens crop yields
ADDIS ABABA Friday, June 26, 2009 (IRIN) - The late start of Ethiopia's wet season and the unreliability of the rains could affect crop production this year and increase the number of those in need of aid, officials said.

ETHIOPIA: Locust threat in northwest
ADDIS ABABA Thursday, June 25, 2009 (IRIN) - Locust swarms have migrated from northwestern Somalia and spread to seven regions of Ethiopia, but have so far caused minimal damage to crops, an official has said.

AFRICA: Prices keep food on the shelves
ADDIS ABABA Monday, June 22, 2009 (IRIN) - An increasing number of Africans living in urban areas are finding it harder to put enough food on the table, the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) has warned.

AFRICA: What will we eat in the future?
JOHANNESBURG Wednesday, June 17, 2009 (IRIN) - It will take at least ten years to develop a variety of staple grain that will survive in the climates caused by global warming in most parts of Africa, and the continent has less than two decades in which to do it, warn the authors of a new study.

AFRICA: Children speak up for right to survive
DAKAR Tuesday, June 16, 2009 (IRIN) - Thousands of children are participating in activities across Africa advocating for governments to boost child survival in commemoration of the Day of the African Child. Celebrated on 16 June, this is the same day hundreds of black school children were killed in Soweto, South Africa in 1976 protests for better education.

AFRICA: 28 days to save a life
DAKAR Tuesday, June 16, 2009 (IRIN) - More than 1,500 babies born on any given day in sub-Saharan Africa will die within 24 hours, according to a recent report by UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the non-profit Save the Children, which measured African government’s progress on improving child health.

AFRICA: Improved infrastructure key to slum upgrading - UN official
NAIROBI Thursday, June 11, 2009 (IRIN) - To successfully upgrade existing slums and prevent more from springing up, countries in the Africa, Caribbean and Pacific regions must convince their governments to allocate more resources to urban infrastructure, services and capacity-building activities, a senior UN official has said.

AFRICA: Agriculture an underestimated "safety net"
JOHANNESBURG Tuesday, June 09, 2009 (IRIN) - Investment in agriculture in developing countries, where most of the workforce consists of small-scale farmers, is akin to beefing up a "safety net" as the world struggles to limit the impact of the economic crisis, a UN agency head told IRIN ahead of the three-day World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting in Cape Town.

AFRICA: Urbanisation, poverty reduction take centre-stage in ACP conference
NAIROBI Monday, June 08, 2009 (IRIN) - More than 200 delegates have arrived in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, for the first joint conference of the Africa, Caribbean and Pacific Group of Countries (ACP) focusing on the challenges of urbanisation and poverty reduction for millions of slum dwellers.

AFRICA: Camel farming could be the answer
JOHANNESBURG Wednesday, June 03, 2009 (IRIN) - Camel farming could be an option for some 20 million to 35 million people living on semi-arid land in Africa, who will soon be unable to grow crops because of climate change, says the co-author of a new study.

ETHIOPIA: Giving peace a chance in South Omo
TURMI Thursday, May 21, 2009 (IRIN) - Zuga Sherdo grew up in a community that was constantly fighting its neighbours in southern Ethiopia.

AFRICA: Coastal populations at risk as climate changes
NAIROBI Wednesday, May 20, 2009 (IRIN) - Several large African cities are at risk from rising sea levels and intense storms, experts warn.

AFRICA: New agriculture funds must target poor farmers
DAKAR Monday, May 18, 2009 (IRIN) - African Development Bank president Donald Kaberuka says medium-size farms are the engine for agricultural growth in Africa and given their position and potential they merit considerable investment. Agriculture campaigners say while they support such an approach, investors must not overlook small-scale farmers.

AFRICA: Helping fragile states survive financial crisis
DAKAR Thursday, May 14, 2009 (IRIN) - Africa has taken a heavy blow with the global financial crisis and this week as the African Development Bank held its annual meetings in Dakar, Senegal, finance ministers, donors and academics gathered to examine ways to help the continent cope and mitigate setbacks. But coping is particularly difficult for post-conflict or “fragile” states, where institutions are tattered and donors wary.

AFRICA: Improve coordination, funding for disaster risk reduction, governments urged
NAIROBI Tuesday, May 12, 2009 (IRIN) - Better coordination between countries and aid agencies is necessary to improve preparedness and response to local and trans-boundary disasters, delegates at the second Africa meeting on Disaster Risk Reduction, held in Nairobi, said.

AFRICA: Tsetse fly costs agriculture billions every year
DAKAR Tuesday, May 12, 2009 (IRIN) - Each year in Africa the tsetse fly causes more than US$4 billion in agriculture income losses, kills three million livestock and infects up to 75,000 people with trypanosomiasis, according to the UN. Though sterilising the flies may help wipe out the offending parasite, it is a long, expensive process that is losing experts to other more well-funded health research, according to scientists.

AFRICA: Tractored out by “land grabs”?
JOHANNESBURG Monday, May 11, 2009 (IRIN) - Rich countries and firms are leasing or buying massive tracts of land in developing nations for the production of food or biofuel.

AFRICA: Disaster preparedness “woefully inadequate”
NAIROBI Wednesday, May 06, 2009 (IRIN) - Ineffective disaster management systems, poor funding and lack of relevant data for planning risk-reduction activities have taken their toll on sub-Saharan African countries, specialists said.

EAST AFRICA: Swine flu scare prompts surveillance scale-up
NAIROBI Tuesday, April 28, 2009 (IRIN) - The East African region is generally not well prepared for a pandemic like swine flu which has killed more than 100 in Mexico and is spreading to other countries, an expert said.

AFRICA: Migrants and meningitis – a moving threat
AGADEZ Tuesday, April 21, 2009 (IRIN) - Health workers in northern Niger, a popular crossing for sub-Saharan migrants travelling to northern Africa and beyond, have reported an increase in migrants hospitalised for meningitis at the state’s regional hospital.

In Brief: No trials for African heads of state
DAKAR Thursday, April 16, 2009 (IRIN) - Alleged war criminals, including heads of states, cannot be targeted by the newly created African Court of Justice and Human Rights, which once functional will become the legal arm of the African Union.

In Brief: United States approves rapid avian flu test
DAKAR Friday, April 10, 2009 (IRIN) - The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved a test that can detect the deadly H5N1 virus in humans through throat or nose swabs in 40 minutes. Current laboratory analyses that detect the avian flu strain can take up to four hours for confirmation.

AFRICA: Learning the grammar of peace
ZANZIBAR Thursday, April 02, 2009 (IRIN) - Is there a time when mediators should not even try to get warring parties round a peace table? The answer is probably not, but timing does seem key to a successful long-term outcome to negotiations.

AFRICA: Mediation 101
ZANZIBAR Thursday, April 02, 2009 (IRIN) - How do you set about mediating in conflict situations? What are the dos and don’ts of a successful negotiation?

In Brief: GPS and malaria
DAKAR Wednesday, April 01, 2009 (IRIN) - Malaria control has long depended on incomplete infection mapping or “spatial medical intelligence”. But in recent years the Malaria Atlas Project (MAP) has used GPS (Global Positioning System) to plot malaria infections based on community surveys in 84 endemic countries.
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