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WFP: Worst drought in south Madagascar in 40 years

24 June 2021
16674
2021-06-24 12:30

Southern Madagascar is experiencing its worst drought in four decades, with more than 1.14 million people in need of food supplies, according to the World Food Programme (WFP). Of those, WFP say an estimated 14,000 people are already in catastrophic conditions, and this will double to 28,000 by October.

WFP Executive Director, David Beasley said "We're facing the worst drought in over 40 year, and this is an area where people depend on their own agriculture; homegrown school meals, smallholder farmers, this is how they live down here but with drought back to back to back, people can't survive and so the government partnering with the World Food Programme and others we're doing the best we can but it's a terrible situation."

 The Global Acute Malnutrition (GAM) in children under five in Madagascar has almost doubled over the last four months, reaching an alarming 16.5 percent. WFP says it needs 78.6 million dollars to provide lifesaving food in the next lean season in order to stop a preventable tragedy from unfolding.

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