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PRESS RELEASE: FAO, Somalia's President commit to ending food crisis
Mogadishu Arbaco 17 October 2012 SMC
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PRESS RELEASE: FAO, Somalia's President commit to ending food crisis
FAO, Somalia's President commit to ending food crisisMogadishu,
Somalia October 16 2012 – Somalia’s newly elected President Hassan Sheikh
Mohamud has said his government will work with the UN Food and Agriculture
Organization (FAO) to prioritize reviving Somalia’s agricultural glory waned by
20 years of war. Participating in events to mark this year’s World Food Day
celebrations in the Somali capital Mogadishu, Sheikh Mohamud, who became
Somalia's first democratically elected president in 20 years, said agriculture
forms a key tenet of his development strategy. “Somalia’s agricultural
performance is a crucial part of my
government’s recovery plan, which seeks to help hardworking Somali communities
to be able to increase local food production to end poverty for ever,” President Sheikh Mohamud adding: “Somali people are able to produce their own
food and we have to make sure that that happens soonest," said President
Sheikh Mohamud while meeting Luca Alinovi, FAO’s representative to Somalia on
Tuesday.
In 2011, a famine affected over 4 million people, or more
than half of the population of Somalia, leading to tens of thousands of deaths.
The cumulative impact of two decades of conflict also worsened a situation of
protracted and complex emergency, which has led to increased vulnerability to
food insecurity. In the midst of one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises,
hunger and malnutrition are some of the major causes of suffering for
significant sections of the population. Latest estimates show 2.12 million
people face acute food security crisis especially in the south. Road
map toagricultural recoveryOnce one of Africa’s leading exporters of
banana and
livestock, the Horn of Africa nation has been torn by years civil strife,
forcing some of most agriculturally productive communities into displacement
and exile. Today, banana exports have fizzled out, while livestock exports
resumed in 2009 following a 9-year bad by Saudi Arabia, a key importer of
Somali animals. “These are very important inroads towards making
Somalismore resilient and that is where FAO and its partners are
concentrating their
efforts by boosting farmers’ and herders’ ability to cope with recurrent
droughts,” said Alinovi. The aid delivered by FAO to more than a
million people was
largely in the form of cash-based interventions that helped vulnerable
communities to immediately buy food which, together with agriculture inputs and
livestock health and production services, allowed people to remain in
theirplaces of origin. Fertilizers and improved seeds were distributed
while 22
million livestock were vaccinated or treated. The agricultural assistance
enabled farmers in the regions of Bay and Shabelle to double production of
maize and sorghum last year, while livestock interventions have been seen to
break a vicious cycle of epidemic outbreaks. A year after 2011's
famine, Somalia is now on the path to
recovery thanks to the timely interventions targeting herders and farmers in
regions plagued by recurrent droughts. FAO, the World Food Programme (WFP) and
the UNICEF have developed joint strategy aimed at enhancing synergies to
increase resilience to droughts and other crises. Targeting
Agricultural CooperativesAgricultural cooperatives are the focus of
World Food Day
2012 with a theme “Agricultural cooperatives – key to feeding the world.” In
the Somali capital Mogadishu, FAO brought together several cooperatives from
the agriculture, livestock and fisheries sectors to strengthen ways of working
together. “Agricultural cooperatives, once better organized and
strengthened, have shown to increase performance of smallholder famers and that
is a key objective in Somalia,” said Alinovi.
FAO also launched a fish-eating campaign targeting the
majority of the Somali population culturally biased against fish. With 20 years
of war and no functional government, Somalia’s farmers and herders bore the
worst brunt of conflict and recurrent droughts.
For any media inquiries or interviews please contact:Frank Nyakairu
Cell: +2522480677 (Mogadishu) +254729867698 (Nairobi), or Email:
Frank.Nyakairu@fao.org .
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