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New Approaches to Alleviating Chronic Food Insecurity in Southern Africa

Tiny and landlocked, Malawi sits south of Tanzania between Mozambique and Zambia in Southern Africa. With chronic food insecurity in Malawi and throughout Southern Africa, many assume that such hardship is somehow endemic in Africa. What, then, can people do when the problems seem structural, prolonged, and uniquely African?

To address the underlying causes of food insecurity in Southern Africa, as well as emergency response, Africare partners with local communities, governments and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to implement effective, long-term solutions in the region. Africare encourages crop diversification away from maize—the staple crop that invariably is vulnerable to drought—and household based food processing (maximizing the value of foods through preparation and conversion, i.e. soybeans to soymilk), of more drought tolerant crops such as soybeans, sunflower and sweet potatoes. The premise, essentially, is that in the long run, farmers and communities in Southern Africa must liberate themselves from dependence on maize, which lacks the nutritional value of other crops, and exhausts the soil.

Kevin Lowther, longtime Africare veteran and Director of Africare’s Southern African Regional Program, expresses an overwhelming need for more effective agricultural approaches in Southern Africa. Lowther recently returned from a regional visit to Southern Africa, including Zimbabwe, Zambia, and Malawi—three countries that are currently hit the hardest by regional drought. Lowther said that “the World Food Program indicated a pending need for Africare to expand programmatic coverage in Zambia,” which was not previously expected to reach the same dire proportions as Malawi. 

A fundamental question is, which mechanisms need to be in place to avert food crises such as Malawi, Zimbabwe or Zambia? This begs a very pressing concern—Southern Africa is a region that is chronically food insecure, and sole dependence on maize means that the story of drought, famine—a bottomless pit— in Southern Africa is going to be rewritten.  

Indeed, just three years back, nearly three million people were in desperate need of food in Malawi, and this year the numbers have escalated to half the population, just over five million. The rainy season usually begins in November and ends in April, but stopped early last year in February. When rains stopped, the World Food Program predicted that the situation would be worse than what happened in 2002, similar to a far more devastating crisis in 1992, which affected nearly 18 million people in Southern Africa.  Rainfall this year has been scant. Now NGOs and the international community are taking action, but are they doing enough?  

Bill Noble, Director of Africare’s Office of Food for Development, said that effective program implementation is particularly challenging in Southern African countries. “This year in Malawi, for example, there have been very low harvest levels, and many factors contribute to this. The coping strategies of people are weakened…HIV/AIDS has decimated households, and fewer people are available to work in the fields,” he said.  

Ntcheu Disctict in Malawi has experienced the devastating impact of drought and food crisis. Africare works in a consortium of eight NGOs to implement a project called Improving Livelihood through Increasing Food Security (I-LIFE). NGOs work collaboratively with the Ministry of Health and Population, the Ministry of Agriculture, and the Ministry of Public Works. 

Grace Kamba, Africare Malawi’s Health and Nutrition Manager, says, “We did a situational analysis in Ntcheu villages, and found that children were being fed only maize porridge and a small portion of vegetables twice in a period of 24 hours,” which does not provide the nutritional balance they need.  

The overriding objectives of I-Life are to protect and enhance the nutritional status of vulnerable groups, and strengthen the capacities of local communities to improve food security through increased food availability and access by increasing agricultural production and incomes, and improving infrastructure. I-LIFE also promotes increased community and district level accountability, transparency, and effectiveness of district government structures.  

Africare’s Malawi Government Targeted Food Distribution program is an emergency response initiative that assists with the recovery of vulnerable populations affected by the adverse weather conditions, HIV/AIDS pandemic, and economic decline by ensuring adequate availability and access to food through the distribution of 4,523 metric tons of food in Ntcheu. 

Now more than ever, people are receptive to crop diversification and realize that the long-term positive impacts far supercede the cost of change. International organizations, state governments, and local communities must be open to proactive measures including new agricultural techniques and ideas, or else regional devastation will continue.