Famine looms in the Sahel, but $1 invested now can save up to $7 later
admin December 7th, 2011
European Commissioner Kristalina Georgieva warned yesterday that the Sahel region of West Africa was in danger of slipping into famine and that help should be provided now – indeed it was already being provided by the EU.
She said that it was not only ethically and morally right to send aid now, before things reached crisis point, but also cheaper in the long run as disaster risk reduction (DRR) is dramatically more cost-effective than responding to disasters.
The Commission says that seven million people are already facing shortages in Niger, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Nigeria and Burkina Faso, with major shortfalls in food production in many areas. The figures point to a massive problem of food availability next year and Niger and Mauritania have already declared a crisis and appealed for international help – an appeal that may well fall on deaf ears given the scale of the famine on the other side of the continent.
The EU, though has already – back in mid-November – increased funding to the Sahel by 10 million euros, on top of the 45 million euros it has given to the region this year. In taking this step, the EU is aiming to learn from the slow response made to the East African famine. ”By acting now and anticipating the crisis ahead we can avoid the terrible suffering that has struck in another part of Africa this year”, Georgieva said when the extra funding was announced.
Commissioner Georgieva also spoke yesterday at the London School of Economics (LSE), where she banged the DRR drum again. She quoted her former employer, the World Bank, saying that every $1 spent on preparedness leads to savings of between $4 and $7 when disaster strikes. “How many investments do you know,” she asked her audience of economists at the LSE, “that can bring a 400% to 700% return?”. Answer came there none.
Her department at the Commission – she is responsible for International Cooperation, Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Response – is planning to spend 10% of its budget on DRR simply because that will save the Commission (and thus all of us) money in the future.
She also pointed to the increasing frequency and intensity of the natural disasters with which we have to deal, citing climate change as the major driver of these disasters. In 1975 there were 78 ‘major natural disasters’ reported worldwide, but by 2010, using the same definition, this number had risen to 385. And the increases in both population and urbanization mean that these disasters have a more intense effect, causing more loss of life, loss of livelihoods and economic damage.
At least three records in the field of natural disasters have been set in 2011, she reported: the worst drought in the Horn of Africa since the mid-1980s; the most expensive disaster ever, with losses of £200 billion attributed to the multiple disasters that hit Japan; and Thailand suffering the worst floods in 60 years to hit South East Asia. “No country or region is now safe from natural disasters,” she said. Even in Europe, natural disasters have cost the European economy 150 billion euros and taken 100,000 lives over the last ten years. Most of the economic cost (52%) has been caused by flooding, but the big killer – especially of the old and children – was the heatwave of 2003.
- East Africa , Europe , News , West Africa
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