Nadine Hutton
"We live like birds, picking our food from the trees, and not knowing what to eat the next day," says Mathombi Dlamini (70). For each month that has passed since the sun scorched the maize that was growing in her fields and food prices started to soar, the food situation has become more difficult for her and her two granddaughters.
Mathombi's granddaughters have the same eyes, nose and smile. They look so alike, and yet different. Sitting next to each other, busily braiding ropes with simultaneous movements, the one almost looks like a shadow of the other.
They are cousins and are both nine-years-old, but Maswane is stunted in growth, and her hair has lost colour and turned brown. The taller Nelisiwe's hair is as black as ebony, but she too is showing signs of malnutrition with a scalp disease and a swollen stomach. Nelisiwe's fingers are quicker and her rope already much longer than Naswane's, but the latter's rope is more neatly made.
They have something else in common. The two nine-year-olds have both lost their parents to AIDS. Since they came to live with their grandmother, they have had to help her raise money for food by making mats and braiding ropes.
Biting on one end of the sisal fibres, they start off the braiding of a new rope. When the rope is long enough they move the end down between their toes and hold it firmly there whilst continuing the work with more lengths of fibres. The fibres look like wispy white hair, uncovered by scraping long, thinly cut sections of the green sisal plant with a dull knife.
The sturdy sisal grows wild here in Silele community in Shizelweni, which is located in Lowveld, the area in Swaziland that was the hardest hit by the drought. A 70 per cent reduction in the yield was reported here after the last maize harvest. Mathombi got two bags of small maize cobs from her field, and like all but the richest households in Lowveld, she depleted her stocks already months ago.
"We are having such a hard life because of the drought. I am old and am losing my strength, but have to look after the small ones," complains Mathombi.
One sisal rope can give Mathombi five emalangeni, if she manages to sell it. Far surpassing her means, the price of a 50 kg bag of maize is already now 150 emalangeni (US$ 14). That's more than double the price at this time last year. And the next harvest is still months away.
According to the recently published Emergency Food Security Assessment Report from the Swaziland National Vulnerability Assessment Committee (VAC), in which the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies participates, these trends are certain to worsen in the coming months before the next main harvest.
The months January-March are typically "lean season", but this year, this could be the season of catastrophe. The VAC-report says that the assessment clearly indicates that if international assistance remains at its current levels, a humanitarian disaster may be unavoidable in the months ahead.
The most frequently cited coping strategy is a change in consumption patterns. Throughout the affected countries in southern Africa, roughly 80 per cent of the interviewed households report eating smaller portions, skipping meals, or even skipping whole days without eating a substantial meal.
The two girls share with us that they like maize porridge. A lot! And they tell us that when they have no food to eat for a long time, they feel like vomiting. "We go to the neighbours and beg. Some give us, some don't have anything," says Naswane.
Many households in their community are in the same situation, and the numbers are increasing. The VAC-report estimates that 24 per cent of the population in Swaziland, or some 265,000 people will be in need of food aid from December.
In all of the six southern African countries affected by the food crisis, the initial estimate was that 12.8 million people would be in need of food aid. The new regional VAC assessment scaled up these figures to 14.4 million people.
Mathombi had eleven children herself, but has only three left. She lives with a 38 year old daughter and her baby girl, and the two orphaned girls. There are no men in the family. According to the VAC-report, rural households that are most vulnerable are typically characterized by being female headed and having orphans. Many like Mathombi and her grandchildren have not yet received any food aid.
In Swaziland, the report says, 41 per cent of households are headed by females, whilst 29 per cent of households have either no adults or only one adult. The HIV/AIDS pandemic is killing breadwinners, and Nelisiwe and Nashwane are only two of thousands of children orphaned because of this wave of infectious disease.
The Baphalali Swaziland Red Cross Society (BRCS) and a consortium of other organizations are coordinating their efforts in the country. BSRCS this week finished their second distribution round of maize, beans and oil provided by the UN World Food Programme at 17 distribution sites in the three areas that they are responsible for - rural Manzini, Northern Hhohho and Shiselweni - covering the needs of approximately 20,000 people.
BSRCS secretary general, Khanie Mabuza, says that there are an additional 17,000 people, at least, that they need food for and fund-raising is underway for this. In addition the German Red Cross is expected to start seed distributions in the near future. "The food situation in Swaziland is clearly deteriorating. We need funds to do new assessments, and food to help more people," says Mabuza.
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