Alarm blue text indicates clickable linksFor news and commentary I often go to Aljzeera. I did on Tuesday and what I read alarmed me. 'Twenty million people are at risk of starvation this year as delayed rains worsen an already brutal drought in Kenya, Somalia and Ethiopia, the United Nations has warned. ‘For months, extreme drought has left the Horn of Africa on the verge of a humanitarian catastrophe, destroying crops and livestock and forcing huge numbers of people to leave their homes in search of food and water.' I would hate to have to leave my home in search of food and water. I hope this map (Act Alliance) is big enough on screen to understand. I had difficulty finding one clear enough. The figures indicate the number of people in a particular region who do not, for whatever reason, probably drought, have certainty of enough to eat. Impact
'“Furthermore, beyond the drought, many of the areas that we are concerned about have been plagued with conflict and insecurity, as well as macroeconomic challenges and rising food prices and recently also by Desert Locust,” said Dr. Phiri, speaking to journalists in Geneva. ' The influence of UkraineDr Phiri is also worried about the affects of the Ukraine-Russian war. “We believe that the Ukraine crisis has indeed taken some of the lustre from the needs of the Horn of Africa region,” he said. “It is important for the world that while they are considering the needs of Ukraine, that they also consider the needs for the Horn of Africa.” There is another but different and arguably more important affect of the Ukraine-Russia conflict. Together those countries supply one quarter of the world's wheat, about 40% of the world's sunflower oil and significant quanties of corn. For countries in the Horn, that makes any wheat they need to buy because of their own crop failures, more difficult to get and more expensive. Earth dayThis is how Wikipedia begins its explanation of Earth Day. 'Earth Day is an annual event on April 22 to demonstrate support for environmental protection. First held on April 22, 1970, it now includes a wide range of events coordinated globally by EarthDay.org (formerly Earth Day Network) including 1 billion people in more than 193 countries. The official theme for 2022 is Invest In Our Planet.' That Earth Day is the day I'm posting a story about drought and the despair it causes I find to be an unpleasant irony. I should, you'd think, be writing on Earth Day, positive stories about recoveries and regeneration but at present stories like that seem a bit distant from The Horn of Africa. HopeHope for the Horn of Africa crisis lies, short term, in governments, industries and large donors giving big money (the UN itself has just released 100 million) that can be used to provide food, especially wheat, and projects to improve water retention. Can smaller donors help too? I often think about this. The few dollars a small donor can provide seem of not much use. But if there are large numbers of small donors, what they contribute becomes significant. I've listed below three or four charities working on the ground in the Horn of Africa. As far as I have been able to check they are also known to be trustworthy in getting money to where it is useful. □ John McInnes Earth Day Friday 22 April 2022 ##########
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