Agriculture
"Teach someone how to find their livelihood and feed them for life" -Ancient proverb
Due to recurrent armed conflict, natural disasters such as floods and drought, disease outbreaks and limited access to basic services and humanitarian space, Somali households increasingly face challenges to maintain a food secure and well-nourished household. Some regions experience insufficient rainfall to grow crops whereas other regions experience floods that damage growing crops. All these circumstances are leading to poor harvests year after year.
As if the situation was not bad enough, Somalia is also currently facing the worst locust infestation in 25 years, that has been ongoing since 2019. The result of this is that many farm owners are losing their crops and any chance of food security for their family, or an income.
Oxfam defines famine as the “triple failure of food production, people’s ability to access food and, finally and most crucially in the political response by governments and international donors. Crop failure and poverty leave people vulnerable to starvation — but famine only occurs with political failure.”
Widespread famine has occurred in Somalia before, and we want to do what we can to help communities build the structures and acquire the knowledge necessary to stand a chance of protecting themselves from environmental and other forces.
The most important solution is to invest in food production on the ground in Somalia. This allows the people to address hunger in Somalia and creates lasting food infrastructure.
It is our aim to improve skills in agriculture through the establishment of community gardens in Somalia as well as provide workshops to the public on diet and nutrition.
Here are some key statistics regarding agriculture and food security in Somalia:
One statistic shows that swarms are destroying enough food per day to feed 35,000 people.
Swarms covering an area as large as 2,400 km2 are moving across East Africa at speeds up to 150 km a day. Every 1km2 locust swarm is composed of approximately 40 million locusts, with larger swarms reaching hundreds of millions.
According to the United Nations, 19 million people in the region are already severely food insecure, and the invasion could cause even more malnutrition and food scarcity.
Over half of the country’s population — 6.7 million people –are now acutely food insecure. That is up from 6.2 million in February.
Only 25% of agricultural irrigation in Somalia is directed through the usage of proper irrigation systems. The other 75% is dependent on water from rainfall or flooding.
70% of its rural households are still depend primarily on agriculture for their livelihood, with 82% of farmers being small and marginal.
