Four Central American countries fighting hunger amid drought and flooding

By Mia Gewertz

Still in the process of recovering from the devastating effects of 1998's Hurricane Mitch, a new problem now faces the people of Central America. With a new wave of the El Nino weather phenomenon heating up the Atlantic Ocean, droughts and floods have caused massive damage to food crops in Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala. These crops are the main source of food as well as income in the region and with losses of over 50 percent of the harvest in some areas, there are now over 1.4 million people facing nutritional problems. Among these, the United Nations World Food Programme has classified almost 776,000 people as facing "critical food security problems".

The World Food Programme launched a huge operation last summer (2001) in an attempt to relieve malnutrition in Central America. This operation delivered 16,500 metric tons of food to 400,000 people at a cost of $7.5 million US. Unfortunately, the resources for this operation were limited and the problem has resurfaced.

In El Salvador, Central America's most densely populated country, 23 percent of the population is considered chronically malnourished. Chronic malnutrition is when the lack of vitamins has affected the body so much that there is a stunt in growth. For children this rate is higher, at 30 percent. Last August the United Nations and World Food Programme assisted 200,000 people in the country, but after one month the food supply had run out.

The Miskito people, an indigenous tribe of Nicaragua, are an example of a community losing all of their crops. The WFP provided 1.2 metric tons of food for the 6,500 people, but that food also ran out quickly.

In 3 months last fall, the incidence of acute child malnutrition in southern Honduras more than doubled, rising to 5.9 percent. Acute malnutrition is measured by a low weight in ratio to height. The chronic malnutrition among children in Honduras is 38 percent. In Honduras, the first harvest of the year typically provides between 65 and 70 percent of the country's food. The 2001 drought caused losses upwards of 40% in the harvest, on some farms the whole crop was wiped out. In a country where the estimated poverty rate is between 65 and 80 percent, it becomes very hard to deal with price increases of up to 40 percent on staples like corn and beans. 91,000 Hondurans received aid from the WFP last July.

Guatemala was another country hit hard by the drought and flooding, with 63,000 people getting relief in the summer. As soon as the food ran out, however, the problem began again and in March of 2002 the World Food Programme authorized an emergency operation in Guatemala involved with sending 8,553 metric tons of vitamin enriched food to help 155,000 people who are suffering from acute malnutrition. Among these 155,000 are over 59,000 children under five years old. Guatemala has the highest chronic malnutrition rate of the region, at 47 percent of young children. As much as 80 percent of the nation's crops were lost in the droughts of the past two years, in a country where most families are rural and make their whole living off of the land. Hunger is the third leading cause of death in Guatemala, since last summer 126 children have already died of malnutrition.

Mia Gewertz is a volunteer with the Social Justice Committee