Same story of suffering as drought cycles ravage land

Although a number of areas in the country received rainfall last two weeks ago, the next three months are likely to be very difficult for people in many parts of the country, and especially pastoral communities.

As a result of the prolonged dry spell, water has become exceedingly scarce, making it hard for them to find food  as well as pasture for their animals. Indeed, overall food production in many parts of the country will remain inadequate until the next harvest, which is still a long way off since weathermen warn of lack of rains until May.

The media have been carrying reports of severe food shortages in different parts country, with people in the worst hit areas eating wild fruits just to survive. These images have become cyclical so the question is, does the government have the capacity to combat drought and feed Kenyans?

Many will remember that in 2011, a serious drought claimed tens of lives as well as more than eight million livestock valued at Sh66 billion. The public, through the Kenyans for Kenya initiative, fundraised to feed more than 3.5 million people facing starvation at the time.

The government says the current drought is as serious as the one in 2011 but points out that, thanks to its speedy intervention, the impact is not as grave.

But even as the government pats itself on the  back for having performed better at “containing” the ongoing emergency, many Kenyans are doubtful of the State’s commitment to initiating sustainable strategies capable of  mitigating the effects of disasters attributable to climate change in the future.

GRIM IMPACT OF DROUGHTS

It is notable that after the devastating drought in 2011, the government made no immediate attempts to come up with plans to mitigate future droughts and only did so in 2012 at the instigation of the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (Igad).

Concerned about the grim impacts of drought in the Horn of Africa, Igad instructed all its member states to draw up drought-mitigation strategies. That is when Kenya set up the National Drought Management Authority to initiate plans for mitigating future droughts.

Before that, the country did not have any plans in place for tackling drought, even though the country had experienced a series of serious droughts since the 1980s, engineer Wangai Ndirangu, a climate change expert told DN2.

“The government has not invested enough in infrastructure such as dams, water pans and water-storage facilities to enable it to handle such cases in the near future,” Mr Ndirangu, notes.

He adds that the government appears keener to respond to emergencies rather than build resilience for the future.

Climate change and agricultural experts say that the government should instead strike a balance between responding to drought emergencies and investing in infrastructures that will prevent such emergencies in the future.

Such infrastructure add to the country’s resilience, without which drought will always remain a cyclical disaster, Mr Ndirangu says.

Other interventions such as warning farmers of impending drought are among the vital strategies that can help build their resilience.

NO ADVICE ON STRAGTEGIES

However, despite having been warned of an impending drought by the government, tens of crop and livestock farmers who spoke to DN2 say nobody advised them on the strategies to use to cushion them from drought-driven losses; some said they didn’t take the warning seriously because of many inaccurate forecasts in the past.

Knowing that there was an impending drought, the government should have advised pastoralists to sell their livestock before it was too late and they were still “market worthy” or to stock silage, and crop farmers to plant drought-resistant and fast-maturing crops to fill the food security gaps.

Now, as a result of its  inefficiency in doing this, the government will have to spend at least Sh220 million buying emaciated and dying animals, even as it plans to spend an estimated Sh21.4 billion between now and May to respond to drought-related emergencies.

However, Mr James Oduor, the chief executive officer of the National Drought Management Authority, says that government is adequately prepared to deal with the situation and blames a communication breakdown between farmers and government experts for the serious crop failure and livestock deaths.

“There were early attempts by the government to buy livestock from pastoralists, especially from the hard hit around the Coast but some farmers refused to sell their animals, saying the drought warning was a hoax,” he says.

FARMERS CLING TO THEIR LIVESTOCK

He adds that in most cases, farmers cling to their livestock until disaster is imminent.

“The information was out there in good time but the other problem is that most farmers might not be able to understand or interpret terms such as ‘below minimum rainfall’ for them to take pre-emptive measures. As a result, some might not know what to plant while others might be able to interpret the information correctly, but lack the means to acquire drought-resistant crop varieties,” he added.

In April and May last year, parts of the country received exceptionally heavy rains, resulting in flash floods that led to loss of lives and damage to property. But as usual, the government had no pro-active measures in place and responded by distributing blankets and food to the communities rendered homeless by the rains as huge amounts of rain water went to waste.

Little was heard about government thereafter until November — barely six months after the floods — in the wake of the drought, when it released funds for buying collapsible tanks, distributing water and repairing boreholes.

Since Kenya is a water-scarce country with more than 17 million people having no access to water, according to the World Health Organisation/United Nations Children’s Fund 2015 water supply statistics, Mr Wafula says that farmers should be trained to use water sources, including water harvesting, storage and using drip irrigation.

In Kenya, every individual is assured of only six cubic metres of water per year, which can only last three days, compared with 46 cubic metres of water per person per year in Ethiopia, which means that even if it doesn’t rain in the neighbouring country for a year, people will still have enough water for their use,”Mr Wangai says.

Yet, Ethiopia has a population of more than 100 million, compared with Kenya’s 47 million.

Mr Wangai added that the government’s slow response has precipitated the crisis.

Despite receiving the climate outlook for October to December in September forewarning of an impending drought, the government waited until January, when the crisis was obvious, to come up with austere measures.

 “The government waited until January to begin strict water rationing in Nairobi when it should have begun implementing the rationing way back in October in a less strict manner that is not so austere to Nairobi residents,” says Mr Wangai.

When such weather predictions are received, he says, farmers should be advised on what to do to cope with the situation. For instance, crop famers should have been advised to grow drought-resistant, fast-maturing crops, and pastoralists to sell their animals to avert the huge losses being witnessed in many parts of the country.

The government has both short- and long-term strategies to manage the situation, but Mr Oduor acknowledges that it did not have any elaborate plans in place until 2013, when the authority was established.

He added that while the government had begun initiatives to buy livestock from pastoral communities way back in October when most animals were still strong and healthy, many livestock farmers at the coast, where the effects of the drought had started being felt, were hesitant to sell their animals in the hope that it would rain soon, he says. “They surrendered their animals only when they realised that the drought was real,” he pointed out.

He says the country is better off today compared with the situation in 2011 when an equally severe drought hit many parts of the country.

“The current drought is the same in magnitude as the one in 2011 but the impact is less because farmers have become resilient. For instance, county governments invested in irrigation, among other interventions, which has helped mitigate the impact of the drought,” says Oduor.

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IRRIGATION SEEN AS SOLUTION TO FOOD INSECURITY

The Galana-Kulalu Food Security Project, the 1 million-acre model farm unveiled in 2014, is perhaps the government’s most serious attempt to bridge the food security gap and mitigate the effects of famine.

The amount of maize produced was expected to lead to a drop in the price of a 2kg bag of maize flour from Sh100 to about Sh84. But apart from the fact that the scheme has been underperforming (producing 10 bags instead of the targeted 40 bags of maize per acre) only 10,000 acres (out of 1 million acres) of the scheme are currently under irrigation. The government planned to irrigate one million acres by 2017.

Mr Vitalis Wafula, regional agronomist for Yara East Africa, a fertilizer manufacturing company, says many Kenyans have no faith in the weather forecasts due to frequent inaccuracies by the weathermen.

“Sometimes it is reported that we should expect heavy rains then the rains don’t come so farmers find it difficult to rely on weather forecasts,” says Mr Wafula, adding that the government should revitalise irrigation schemes around the country to enhance food security.

He says most of the country’s irrigation schemes were established in the 1960s, and that nothing has been done to improve them since then.

“Kenya currently has seven additional, large-scale irrigation schemes in progress (besides Galana-Kulalu), namely the Mwea, Bura, West Kano, Perkerra, Tana, Bunyala and Ahero irrigation schemes. According to the government, the country’s irrigation potential stands at 1.3 million hectares. To date, only 12 per cent, or 162,000 hectares, have been exploited” says Dr Brendon Cannon, an environmental expert.