Courtesy: BBC News. Haruna.
 
     
 
Niger - UN warning over total crop failure 

  
Drought has prevented millet plants from forming  grains

Niger is threatened with total crop failure in some  areas and the 
situation is worse than the 2005 crisis, the UN humanitarian  chief has told the 
BBC.  
But John Holmes said the new government is co-operating in aid efforts.   
Ex-President Mamadou Tandja, toppled in a coup in February, was  criticised 
for doing too little then and saying the crisis had been  exaggerated.  
Nearly 8m people are affected by the drought this year and the UN says  up 
to $130m (£85.5m) is needed to help them.  
'Alarm sounded' 
On a visit to the West African country, Mr Holmes said aid agencies had  
identified - and were dealing with - the problem early enough to make a  
difference.  
  
 
I have a daughter who attends school; she  can't eat every day 



Zinder resident




_In pictures: Niger's food crisis_ 
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8637487.stm)   

"We have sounded the alarm much earlier," he told the BBC's Network  Africa 
programme  
"And we are tackling it much earlier so I hope that we can avoid the  
worst, and avoid the kind of scenes we've seen before in Niger or in  Ethiopia in 
the 1980s."  
The UN emergency relief co-ordinator was visiting the Zinder area of  
southern Niger, where he said rates of malnutrition in children had  increased 
because of the lack of food.  
People in Zinder told the BBC about how the food shortages were  affecting 
their lives.  
"I don't have any food because this year has been very hard," said Nana  
Mariama.  
"I seldom have one meal a day: my breakfast. I have a daughter who  attends 
school; she can't eat every day. My husband has gone to Nigeria to  fetch 
food."  
Another man said he had lost more than 80 cattle.  
"The remaining donkeys are so weak that we have to help. We have to  lift 
them up every time, because there is no food. No pasture."  
Mr Holmes said he was optimistic that the current military junta was  
serious about dealing with Niger's food crisis.  
"But we have some advantages in that the government is much more open  
about it and cooperative about it [the food crisis] than they were in  2005," he 
told the BBC.  
Elizabeth Byrs, spokesperson for the UN Office for the Co-ordination of  
Humanitarian Affairs in Geneva, said the government had already taken some  
action.  
"Current activities implemented by the state and its partners include  
cash-for-work programmes, low-price sales, cattle-feed distribution,  cereal 
banks and targeted nutritional blanket feeding programme to prevent  
malnutrition," she said.  
But a lot still remains to be done, she  added.

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