Further emergency experience

Drought in east Africa and the Horn of Africa, 2005 - 2006

It is well recognised that droughts in sub-Saharan Africa have increased in frequency and severity in recent years.  In response to this, VETAID is working to improve drought-preparedness and response activities in the areas where we work.

VETAID’s response to the ongoing drought in east and the Horn of Africa provided appropriate emergency aid to vulnerable livestock-keeping communities in affected countries. The aim was to protect the livestock of pastoral and agro-pastoral communities as much as possible during the emergency situation to allow them to resume their livelihoods when the crisis eases.

VETAID received funding from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) for a water-tankering project to benefit pastoralists in Gedo, Bari and Karkaar regions, Somalia, who were severely affected by the drought.

The project in Gedo trucked water to 2,500 breeding cattle and 1,100 sheep and goats to allow them to utilise the pasture areas of Bardera and El-wak Districts. This helped to preserve the livelihood base of the community and allowed them to recover more rapidly from the drought by maintaining at least some of their core breeding stock. The project also supplied water to 3,600 pastoralist families. In addition, VETAID carried out the rehabilitation of water catchment structures and removed livestock carcasses which had been disposed of in wells and dams.

VETAID also provided emergency veterinary treatments in the districts of Kitui, Makueni and Machakos of Ukambani region, Kenya, another area severely affected by the drought. This work formed part of the CERF project, coordinated by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the UN and covering all of the arid and semi-arid districts of Kenya.

Severe weather in Mongolia

In March 2000, severe winter weather in Mongolia resulted in high livestock mortality. Although VETAID had not worked in Mongolia before, we were requested to help respond to this urgent situation because of our experience in this field. 

VETAID joined forces with the Brooke Hospital for Animals to provide fodder and veterinary medicines for livestock. This intervention saved the lives of many livestock, thus helping to prevent more herders being driven into destitution.

 

 

Flooding in Mozambique

In summer 2000, VETAID responded to severe flooding in Mozambique by providing emergency treatment to injured animals and moved surviving livestock to safer locations. The flooding halted our existing programme in southern Mozambique as we concentrated on providing the affected areas with access to services that would allow them to restart their farming activities.

Our five main activities were:

• Supplying seeds and tools to allow replanting as soon as the flood waters subsided.

• Restocking to allow farmers to earn an income again. Goats and poultry for each family helped to make up the shortfall in crop production.

• Rehabilitation and construction of the infrastructure needed to protect the livestock population (i.e. treatment corridors and diptanks).

• Training of community based animal health workers to provide basic animal health services.

• Surveillance of livestock to treat sick animals and to contain possible outbreaks of epidemics.

HIV/AIDS crisis in Swaziland

In 2002 we worked in partnership with the Swaziland Red Cross on a pilot project to address the impact of HIV/AIDS on rural communities in Swaziland.  We provided affected families with poultry which is well suited to low management and survival in the area. This improved the food security and income of vulnerable households.

Flocks of chickens were distributed to community members for them to then provide other local people with some of the chicks. They began breeding the chickens and eating and selling the eggs as soon as the distributed chickens started laying.  Once the flock was of a reasonable size they were also able to eat and sell the chickens. This increase in egg and chicken production has led to improvements in the nutritional, financial and capital status of beneficiary homesteads.

These improvements have taken the form of an increase in protein intake (the number of families eating eggs has more than doubled), sale of eggs and chickens (the number of eggs eaten or sold each month has tripled and the number of chickens eaten or sold each month as increased 800%!) and through improving their income through having chickens to breed. The sustainability of the project is guaranteed as the chickens are hardy and productive and do not depend on expensive feeds to remain productive, subsisting well on maize and whatever else they find whilst scratching.

We have since started HIV/AIDS impact mitigation programmes in Kenya and Tanzania.