The CGIAR Consortium is holding a live interactive panel today on challenges and solutions to the Food Crisis in the Horn of Africa. The Daily Kos also reports that Chris Funk, who leads a Famine Early Warning System Network (FEWS Net), says that FEWS Net gave early warning of the drought-related hunger facing the Horn … Continue reading
A Dinka cattle camp at sunset in Abyei, Sudan; the Sudanese Dinka people migrate north with 5,000 of their cattle from Warrap State to Abyei when floods hit their grazing area (photo on Flickr by UN/Tim McKulka). Migratory herding is one of the most productive uses of drylands, says the Kenyan newspaper the Daily Nation. The … Continue reading
Climate and food security expert Jim Hansen, based at the International Research Institute for Climate and Society, at Colombia University, recently laid out some of the causes of food insecurity in drought-afflicted East Africa. Among the main reasons he cites is a decline, since the 1990s, in agricultural research and development in this region, a … Continue reading
Watering camels in a makeshift trough on the road from Wajir to Garissa, in northeast Kenya; herders are taking advantage of the rains to water their livestock after a long period of drought (photo on Flickr by Ann Weru/IRIN). The New Agriculturist this month reports on a recent study by the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) … Continue reading
The landscape of Tigray, Ethiopia, which was the centre of famine in that country 25 years ago but is now managing to remain food secure due to years of agricultural and other investments (photo on Flickr by hhesterr). Mark Malloch-Brown is in good, and candid, form in an opinion piece in Reuters published yesterday. ‘. … Continue reading
Andrew Mude of ILRI receives the best practice award for an Index-based Livestock Insurance project in northern Kenya that he leads (image from The Poverty Reduction, Equity and Growth Network [PEGnet] conference in Midrand, South Africa, 2–3 Sep 2010). As hunger spreads among more than 12 million people in the Horn of Africa, a study … Continue reading
Artists from around the world have painted canvases illustrating the human impact of climate change in their countries. Sixteen of these canvases were exhibited at UN climate negotiations in Poznan, Poland, in December 2008 (artist: Ashley Cecil; image on Flickr by Piotr Fajfer / Oxfam International). Bryan Walsh delves into a rich discussion of the possible … Continue reading
In Kenya’s drylands, drought has always been the greatest hazard faced by livestock herding families. Modern pressures are making this situation worse. This film tells the story of a research project started in 2007, which in 2010 introduced a new form of insurance to remote herding peoples who had never been provided with insurance before. … Continue reading
Nine-year-old livestock herder near Kitengela town, outside Nairobi, at the height of the 2008–2009 drought in this region; dryland peoples in East Africa are both restricted and marginalized (photo on Flickr by Jeff Haskins). Simon Levine says in an opinion piece in the New Agriculturist this month that the current famine in the Horn of … Continue reading
Rendille livestock herders in northern Kenya, near Lake Turkana (photo on Flickr by Robin Hutton). ‘Mobile herding or pastoralism remains the most economically viable production system for the drylands of Kenya and should be encouraged, according to livestock experts. Because of the current drought, there have been calls for local communities to shift to crop … Continue reading
ILRI Clippings 