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HOKKAIDO - JAPAN: The
controversial figures of the number of severely
malnourished children in Ethiopia has once again
grabbed international attention after Medecins
sans Frontieres (MSF), one of the over 3,000
NGOs operating in the country, has disclosed it has
admitted 6,500 of them in Oromia and the Southern
Nations Nationalities and Peoples regional states,
since mid-May 2008.
This is a major blow to the government that is
already at odds with such humanitarian
organizations, accusing them of exaggerating the
number of children affected by the current drought
in the country.
MSF delegates revealed the figure on Tuesday, July
8, at the summit of leaders from eight of the
richest countries (G-8), held in Hokkaido, Japan.
MSF has also requested these leaders to take bold
decisions to finance food aid and nutrition
programmes adequately, directed at young children.
One of the participants of this year’s summit
representing “Outreach African Countries” is Prime
Minister Meles Zenawi, whose administration
officials have openly expressed their disappointment
over aid agencies as well as the international media
for picking on a drought that it argues has not gone
out of its control. Meles attended the Summit
briefly, flying back to Ethiopia on Wednesday, July
9, a day before the conclusion of the Summit,
Following the failure of rains in February and March
this year, a season locally known as Belg,
drought hit parts of Oromia, Southern and Somali
regional states, with hot spots emerging in Tigray
and Amhara regional states, resulting in alleged
deaths and starvation of children. UNICEF initially
put the number of severely malnourished people and
children under five to be six million and 126,000,
respectively. This was subsequently echoed by other
agencies with the international media forcing
authorities to respond.
Simon Mechale, director general of the Disaster
Prevention and Preparedness Agency (DPPA), and
Addisu Legesse, deputy prime minister and Minister
of Agriculture and Rural Development, eventually
downsized the much-debated figure to 4.6 million and
75,000, respectively. They told the media and
members of Parliament that the drought was under
control.
However, this is in direct contradiction to what MSF
told the eight industrialised and most powerful
nations of the world last week.
“There is an urgent need to act now to scale up
treatment for children who are most at risk of dying
of malnutrition,” Susan Shepherd (PhD), nutritional
advisor for MSF’s Access to Essential Medicines
Campaign, told Fortune in Hokkaido.
An estimated ninety per cent of children with most
severe form of malnutrition in the world do not get
adequate treatment, according to her.
The UN estimates eight billion dollars would be
needed each year to fund comprehensive nutrition
strategies for children and women in 100 million
families at risk. An amount of one and a half
billion of this is needed annually to treat those
children most at risk of death from the severe form
of malnutrition.
The malnutrition came against a backdrop of rising
food prices, one of the currently pressing issues
intensely discussed at the summit. Although
malnutrition was not the main agenda of the summit,
the leaders have discussed rising global food
prices.
“We are determined to take all the possible measures
in a coordinated manner, and since January 2008 have
committed, for short, medium and long term purposes,
over 10 billion dollars to support food aid,
nutrition interventions, social protection
activities and measures to increase agricultural
output in affected countries,” said a joint
statement by the leaders, released on Tuesday.
After the first summit of the industrialised nations
was held in Rambouillet, France thirty-three years
ago, Japan has effectively hosted the summit in
Toyako, Hokkaido, a green island to the north east
of the country. This is the fifth time leaders of
the group of eight countries have gathered in Japan.
Main themes for discussion in this year’s discussion
were world economy, environment and climate change,
as well as development and Africa. |
