Niger Appeal
A major food shortage hit West Africa in 2005 caused by severe droughts and a massive locust invasion which swept the area during the growing season and destroyed the harvest. The food shortage affected over eight million people in West Africa, leaving them at risk of severe hunger and malnutrition.
The crisis hit four of the world’s poorest countries: Niger, Mali, Mauritania and Burkina Faso. These are areas characterised by extreme poverty and high levels of vulnerability.
The Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC) appeal raised £28 million. The immediate focus was the distribution of emergency food supplies, focusing on the most vulnerable – children and pregnant women. Mobile feeding centres, nutrition programmes for children and cereal banks were set up.
The DEC agencies also worked to prevent diseases that occur due to lack of food – such as cholera, typhoid, diarrhoea, acute respiratory infections and measles – as well as treating illnesses related to malnutrition. Rehydration salts were provided for severely dehydrated children, mobile monitoring teams visited people too sick to get to hospital, and supplements were supplied (such as vitamin A for malnourished children and folic acid for pregnant women).
In the longer term, agencies worked with the people affected to help rebuild food supplies. They set up irrigation systems so women could grow vegetables to feed their families, provided cattle fodder to feed cattle during the dry season and organised seed fairs to distribute seeds. To prevent a disaster of this scale happening again, the agencies educated people on how to protect the crops from locusts.
Board Statement
DEC Board Review of the Niger (Sahel) Appeal – July 2007
At the June board meeting the DEC trustees were pleased to consider the independent Report to the Board on the DEC Niger Crisis Appeal, carried out between 23 March and 17 April 2007 by CDR Resources Ltd as part of the board’s regular review of each appeal’s income and expenditure.
The DEC responded to news of the humanitarian crisis in the Sahel region by launching the Niger Crisis Appeal on 2 August 2005, which raised £18 million. This enabled member agencies already present in the affected countries to scale up and for others to set up rapidly in order to respond to the crisis. In all, four counties benefited from the funds: Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso and Mauritania. Read more on the board statement.
Download the Board Review of the Niger (Sahel) Appeal (PDF)