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afrol News, 29 April - The large amount of households affected by natural disasters in Mauritania are not getting enough help "to develop survival strategies," a new report warns. The rural exodus to urban centres is booming as families sell off all their remaining valuables just to be able to survive. According to the US Agency Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS), the population affected by the torrential rains in January - resulting in the loss of agricultural production, fields, livestock, pasture and housing - is now incapable of helping itself through the crisis. "The mobilised help in their favour by the [Mauritanian] state and its development partners is insufficient," FEWS concludes in a new report on food security in Mauritania. According to the World Food Program (WFP), some 250,000 Mauritanians are affected by the food crisis in the country as a result of decades of desertification, an ongoing drought and the off-season rainstorms in the nation's remaining agricultural zone, at its southern border. According to the UN agency, Mauritania is experiencing an "unprecedented food crisis." FEWS updates the situation, referring to the just published final results of the cereal production 2001-02. According to the numbers by the Ministry for Rural Development and Environment, irrigated agricultural fields have suffered the main losses this season, shrinking by 18 percent. Regional differences are significant, reflecting the impact of the January rains. Also sesame and walo - a local food security crop - production has noted significant drops. Even more disturbing is the situation of livestock and pastures, the traditional last security for households in difficult times, also giving some liberty of movement if local conditions are too harsh. "Pastoral conditions continue to be degraded in all the country," FEWS reports. The grass land was rotting as a consequence of the rains in the south-west of the country and those capable had to leave for other zones at a premature stage. The more "privileged pastoral zones" further north therefore have received an unsustainable load of livestock from disaster victims, threatening the carrying capacity of the pastures. A collapse is foreseen. The food crisis has led to a price hike of cereals in rural markets. According to FEWS, prices are at the highest level since 1984 - a year of drought and famine - in the affected rural areas. At the same time, the prices of imported food has been risen sharply, especially rice, maize, oil sugar and milk. Urban markets are somewhat less affected by the increased prices, demonstrating that lacking infrastructure still is a danger to food security in Mauritania. However, urban poors are in no way unaffected by the food crisis, as the price hike and rural displaced are starting to reach shanty towns. Especially the booming rural-urban migration is influencing the life of the urban poor as competition for employment and scarce agricultural lands is increasing rapidly. Rural immigrants to town usually search for some acres of land and water to grow some food crops. FEWS warns of the seriousness of the ongoing food crisis in Mauritania, where all traditional ways of securing survival are endangered. The US agency especially notes "the limited reaction by donors and the incapacity of the affected population to develop new survival strategies" as concerning issues. The World Food Program (WFP) earlier this month made an urgent appeal to the international community for US$ 7.5 million to help feed the population affected by the natural disasters. WFP reported that rural affected families already have reduced main meals from two to one and are starting to sell off family possessions; classical warning signs of a serious food crisis. Also a rise in child malnutrition, abortion and diarrhoeal disease is registered among affected poor agriculturalists and small-scale livestock farmers. In addition to the January rains and current drought, the current crisis comes as a result of 30 years of climatic degradation, including increased droughts and desertification. These decades of climatic degradation has made Mauritania's agricultural zone shrink to a 200 km wide strip running east to west along the Senegalese border.
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