Survey reveals half Darfur households are Starving

The continuing violence caused by the Janjaweed militia in Darfur has led to many problems in Sudan. In face of the bloodiest slaughter and torture, many Sudanese have been forced to flee from their homes in order to secure their lives. It is estimated that there are now more than 1.5 million refugees living in the camps set up by aid agencies.

Nevertheless, more still has to be done to support the Sudanese, especially in terms of food supply, the World Food Programme (WFP) of the United Nations revealed yesterday.

Almost 22 percent of children under the age of five are malnourished and almost half of all families do not have enough food, the recent survey said.

Large numbers of children, women and pregnant women in Darfur were found to be deficient in minerals and vitamins. More than half of the children and a quarter of the women are suffering from anaemia. Health problems are widespread with more than 40 percent of children having diarrhoea and 18 percent acute respiratory infections.

A stark discovery, however is that internally displaced people (IDPs) living within the camps provided can often be worse off than local residents, basically because most of them are not able to obtain sufficient food by their own means and have to rely on food assistance. Only 6 percent of refugees in the camp are self reliant on food in contrast to 46 percent of local residents.

Even though food aid played a critical role by already reaching 70 percent of households among 1.5 million IDPs at the time of the survey, a quarter of IDPs were critically short of food, with aid not reaching 16 percent in adequate amounts. In addition, eight percent did not receive any food assistance at all. This shows that food assistance provided by the aid agencies has a room for improvement.

WFP said more than just food was needed to solve the crisis.

“While much has been done for months now to feed as many people as possible in Darfur, the survey underlines how much remains to be done,” said Ramiro Lopes da Silva, WFP country Director in Sudan, “But food alone is not enough - the response also has to be significantly stronger on water, sanitation and health.”

A basic minimum public health package, including adequate supplies of clean water and medicine, should accompany food and nutrition aid, WFP suggested.

"The situation is very precarious," said WFP Senior Nutritionist Rita Bhatia, who co-led the 70 team members in Darfur on the three-week survey. “Humanitarian assistance is going to be required for some time and needs to be increased.”

Non-Governmental Organisations have arranged supplementary and therapeutic feeding programmes in Darfur, but they are still not operational in some areas. The report recommended an immediate and comprehensive review of feeding programmes to identify gaps and improve their coverage.

Unfortunately, because of the volatile security situation in Darfur, aid workers cannot always go where they are needed, so some people commented that implementation of a wider feeding programme is logistically very difficult.

As the number of refugees continues to increase, WFP have estimated that they will need to feeding at least 1.7 million people in Darfur by the end of the year. WFP pledges to refine their response to the current crisis and press the donors for much-needed support.

The survey, conducted during August and September, is the first comprehensive assessment of food availability since the Darfur crisis began some 20 months ago. In collaboration with the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, the UN Children’s Fund, the Atlanta-based Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, the United States and United Kingdom branches of Save the Children and with the support of Sudan’s Ministries of Health and Agriculture and its Humanitarian Aid Commission, WFP collected data on more than 5,000 people at 56 sites.