Zimbabwe's Food Shortage Worsen as Country's Worst Drought Ever Recorded Hits

Zimbabwe was hit by the worst drought the country has ever recorded. It causes around 3 million or 23 percent of the population to go hungry. 

Zimbabwe has received very little rainfall at the end of January, it is less than 75 percent of what they are expected, according to George Kembo, director of Zimbabwe Food and Nutrition Council during the signing ceremony of a $10 million donation made by the US government for hunger alleviation, as reported by NewsdzeZimbabwe.

"The Zimbabwe Vulnerability Assessment Committee (Zimvac) had initially said that about 1,5 million would be food insecure, a figure that rose to 2,8 million then the current three million. After all the preliminary work has been done, we do not expect the figure to rise significantly from this," Kembo said.

Harry Thomas, US Ambassador to Zimbabwe, announced an additional $10 million during the event to aid the country's food security situation. Zimbabwe is now appealing to international donor community following the declaration of drought emergency as the need a prompt relief operation to prevent the crisis.

Eddie Rowe, director of World Food Programme said that a group of NGO's will discuss ways in reaching the affected areas to provide help next week, according to New Zimbabwe. "As you know, we are giving aid to 800 beneficiaries' in areas where crop harvest was poor and we are yet to discuss the current situation when we meet," said Rowe.

He said that they have the capacity to help all areas, however, the greatest challenge they have right now is the deployment of the resources. Rowe has been around the country to assess the situation personally to make sure that the help they are going to provide will give a good impact to solve the country's problem.

Meanwhile, the ministry of Agriculture revealed on a report that Zimbabwe has food supplies good for only three months. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) already received $35 million funding for drought relief, securing 600,000 rural Zimbabwean's enough food supplies to survive the drought.