eBusiness Weekly
Kudzanai Sharara
UN World Food Programme (WFP) has placed Zimbabwe among the top 18 countries in the world that are likely to plunge into crises that pose serious threats to people’s food and livelihoods.
In a report released last Saturday, titled “Global Hotspots” , the WFP identified world countries needing rapid assistance and increased funding due chiefly to the destructive effects of conflict, political instability and climate-induced disasters in the case of Zimbabwe.
The WFP Global Hotspots report categorises food insecure countries under overheating, followed by boiling, then simmering.
Zimbabwe was among the overheating countries, the worst affected ones, with the WFP saying the southern African country is in need of immediate support following two consecutive drought induced poor agriculture seasons.
Zimbabwe, the only southern African country to feature in the report, is experiencing its highest food insecurity levels in a decade, with latest analysis from an International Food Classification report estimating about 4,3 million people facing severe acute food insecurity.
Food inflation had increased to over 700 percent at the last count in February, and is likely to rise further amid projections the country had another poor harvest and will continue to import its food requirements.
In a humanitarian appeal for assistance made last week Thursday, President Mnangagwa indicated that at least 7,7 million people are in need of food assistance.
He said a total US$955,6 million is needed as a response to food insecurity with US$683 million earmarked for the rural population while US$272 million is for the vulnerable urban communities. In its own appeal made on Wednesday this week, the WFP requested for US$130 million, “to sustain through August an emergency operation to prevent millions of the country’s most vulnerable people plunging deeper into hunger”.
The WFP warned that coronavirus which has so far infected 11 and killed three of those “threatens to exacerbate Zimbabwe’s dire economic and hunger crises, drastically affecting the lives of people in both urban and rural areas”.
“With most Zimbabweans already struggling to put food on the table, the COVID pandemic risks even wider and deeper desperation,” said Eddie Rowe, WFP’s Country Director.
WFP Global Hotspots report also recognised Covid-19 as a potential threat saying “since work began on this update, Covid-19 has emerged to pose a potentially major threat to countries around the world.
