OXFAM is say­ing that the rainy sea­son in East Africa has failed again this year.

Dur­ing Novem­ber and Decem­ber, East Africa receives the rains needed to grow that year’s crop. This year, only five per­cent of the usual amount of rain fell in the region. Mak­ing this the fourth rainy sea­son in a row to fail.

From this Asso­ci­ated Press arti­cle that we found at the Star Tri­bune, reporter Kather­ine Houreld describes the OXFAM report.

Oxfam said in its report that the fail­ure of the Novem­ber “short” rains in many pock­ets of East Africa after sev­eral dry sea­sons will inten­sify hunger and dis­ease. Heav­ily used and pol­luted water sources have not been replen­ished. Mil­lions of peo­ple are at risk in Kenya, Ethiopia, Soma­lia, Uganda and Tan­za­nia, Oxfam said.

The semi­arid and arid areas depend on the October-November rain­fall, called the short rains, for most of their water needs for the year. A fail­ure of the rains means those areas will have poor or no har­vests for the com­ing year.
…

A Sep­tem­ber report by the Inter­na­tional Food Pol­icy Research Insti­tute pre­dicted that the world­wide effects of cli­mate change will lead to twenty-five mil­lion addi­tional chil­dren becom­ing mal­nour­ished by 2050. Aid agen­cies have long said that droughts are becom­ing more fre­quent in Africa, where many liv­ing in arid areas are par­tic­u­larly vul­ner­a­ble to changes in the weather.

Oxfam said cat­tle prices have tum­bled from $200 to $4 in some areas as fam­i­lies try to sell dying ani­mals to buy a few hand­fuls of corn. Over 1.5 mil­lion ani­mals have died in Kenya, Tan­za­nia and Uganda, with an esti­mated net worth to the region of nearly $360 mil­lion, Oxfam said.

For many nomadic fam­i­lies liv­ing with­out access to bank­ing facil­i­ties, cat­tle rep­re­sent their only wealth. The ani­mals’ deaths begin a spi­ral into poverty and depen­dency that can trap a fam­ily for gen­er­a­tions. Fam­i­lies have even shared relief grain with their ani­mals, try­ing to keep at least a few alive to restock in the future.

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