NAN-F-31
Hunger
Harare, Aug. 23, 2017 (Xinhua/NAN) At least 1.1 million rural dwellers in Zimbabwe will be food insecure during the peak of the hunger season from January – March 2018, according to a Humanitarian Agency Report released in Harare on Wednesday.
The Zimbabwe Vulnerability Assessment Committee (ZimVAC) 2017 rural livelihoods assessment report stated that the 1.1 million people constitute 11 per cent of the country’s rural population that will be food insecure in 2018.
This is a major decline from the 4.1 million people or 42 per cent of Zimbabweans that were food insecure between January and March this year as a result of a devastating drought in 2016.
The reduction in the estimated number of rural people who would be affected by food scarcity in 2018 has to do with the bumper maize harvest recorded by Zimbabwe this year after 2.1 million tons of the staple maize was produced against national annual consumption of 1.8 million tons.
“As expected, there is a progressive increase in the proportion of food insecure households as the consumption year progresses toward the peak hunger period,” ZimVAC said in the report.
ZimVAC is a consortium of Zimbabwe government, UN agencies, Non Governmental Organisations and other international organisations established in 2002.
It is led and regulated by the government with the mandate of promoting a muti-sectoral response to food insecurity and nutrition problems in the country. (Xinhua/NAN)
OYE/AMY
=====
Edited by Celine-Damilola Oyewole/Abdullahi Yusuf