NEPAL: Famine Stalks Remote Mountain Villages Hit By Bad Weather

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Suman Pradhan

KATHMANDU, May 22 1998 (IPS) - Thousands of villagers in Nepal’s remote mountainous districts are caught in the grips of an unprecedented famine which could further worsen if the government fails to rush emergency food supplies.

Reports reaching Kathmandu, Nepal’s capital, say that unexpected storms and bad weather have destroyed seasonal crops of paddy, millet, wheat and maize leading to widespread hunger in remote Himalayan districts.

A government official in the outlying north-western district of Humla which borders Tibet said over the phone that local people had resorted to eating wild grass and weeds from nearby jungles due to an acute shortage of foodgrains.

“In the last one month alone, we have received reports of 133 deaths in Humla district due to starvation and diseases,” Jeevan Prasad Oli, the government-appointed chief district officer of Humla told IPS. Unofficial estimates are much higher.

A government doctor who toured the famine-hit areas early this week with relief medical supplies said that poor villagers are eating wild weeds and grass, which are often poisonous.

“That is leading to diseases, illness and death in the areas,” Dr Gunaraj Awasthi said. “Though medical supplies are also immediately needed to fight the diseases, what the villagers need most is food without which illnesses cannot be controlled.”

Humla is not the only district in the grips of famine. Government officials in Kathmandu say other remote districts including Mugu, Jumla, Dolpa and Bajhang — all perched on high mountainous terrain — are also battling similar situations. Altogether, more than 200,000 people in the districts have been affected by the famine, they say.

Parliamentarians from the affected districts have blamed the weather. Dipak Jung Shah, an MP, said, “Frequent hail-storms and heavy downpour which is not the norm for this time of the year have damaged maize and wheat crops.”

Another lawmaker Chakra Bahadur Shahi also has similar stories to tell. Both the parliamentarians along with a handful of their colleagues have appealed to the government and aid agencies to rush food supplies to the affected areas to ward off starvation.

The situation is compounded further by the remoteness of the famine-hit districts. Nepal has still to connect all its villages by roads or ropeways.

Villagers routinely measure journeys, even short ones, by the number of days it takes them to complete it by foot rather than in hours. Some of the affected districts are linked by small aircraft. But this too depends upon the vagaries of weather.

The government agency responsible for storing, transporting and distributing essential food supplies says that practical difficulties are leading to delays in transportation of food to the affected areas.

Nepal Food Corporation (NFC), the agency, says that it costs three times the money to transport foodgrain to remote villages, than to buy and store them. NFC has already dispatched emergency supplies of wheat to the areas, but most of it is still on the road, being hauled up steep mountain sides by porters and animals.

Some emergency supplies have reached their destinations though. But the amount is too little. Local newspapers report say that hungry families are receiving only a meager ration of 10 kgs of wheat a month in Humla whereas earlier, they used to receive four times as much.

The government responded Thursday to the famine-situation by raising the quantity of food supplies. “We are increasing the food quota for various districts by 55,690 quintals (one quintal is 100 kgs),” a government press statement said Thursday. “This is in response to the situation in various districts which have been hit hard by unseasonal weather patterns.”

The reports of starvation and death comes just a few weeks after Nepal’s leading agriculture experts warned of deteriorating food security in the coming years if the government and international aid agencies fail to boost agriculture production.

Agriculture still accounts for 41 percent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and employs over 80 percent of the labour force. But production has steadily failed to meet rising demand in recent years due to population growth.

“The country is already finding it difficult to meet the rising demand for food,” says Dr. Devendra Prasad Chapagain, a resource economist who recently helped draft a 20-year agriculture plan for the government. “Annual shortfall in food

production is much more than the government admits.”

Once a foodgrain exporter, Nepal has now become imports- dependent. Out-dated agricultural techniques, and reliance on the monsoon rains, have been singled out as the prime factors influencing low output.

According to the Statistical Information of Nepalese Agriculture, in fiscal 1995-96, despite a “good harvest” and imports of grain from other countries, a total of 34,351 metric tonnes of cereals was in short supply in Nepal.