By JOWIT SALUSEKI –
ZAMBIA like other countries such as Malawi, Zimbabwe and Madagascar has been hit by flash floods which have the potential to threaten food security.
The Southern African nations are reeling from the effects of Tropical Storm Ana and Batsirai which have battered communities destroying not only crops and animals but causing fatalities too.
Food security is threatened.
Parts of Southern, Western, Eastern, Lusaka and Copperbelt provinces are currently experiencing flash floods which are causing untold misery on the affected communities.
While the cost of rebuilding will take years, the immediate impact of the flash floods ravaging communities will be seen through food insecurity and malnutrition.
Families that would ordinarily fend for themselves are now entirely depending on the Government , well-wishers, civil society organisations(CSOs) and the international community to provide for them basic items such as food, tents and beddings.
This is because heavy rainfall in recent days had triggered a devastating flash flood which in some places destroyed the nearly ready-to-harvest annual crops and resulted in significant income loss of local dwellers.
Despite the handouts the inhabitants are receiving from the authorities, the long term effects of floods will be felt as the residents count the cost of loss of crops such as maize, rice, cassava, sorghum and millet which they had already planted.
While the nutritional value of food will be greatly compromised on the other hand, the cost for replanting damaged fields to wane off food insecurity for average households will be expensive.
This is because most crops have entirely been destroyed as these communities become submerged by flash floods.
In Zambia, the flash floods are coming at a time when according to estimates by the World Food Programme (WFP) in the last decade alone; floods have affected nearly one billion people worldwide.
Floods are the most common natural disaster and are increasing in frequency and intensity due to climate change, with short and long-term impacts on the health and livelihoods of communities.
They can take many forms, from flash floods causing direct trauma and destruction of settlements to inundation that destroys crops and spreads water-borne pathogens.
It is in this regard that floods can result in disruptions of the food system, which may lead to food insecurity and undernutrition.
Undernutrition denotes insufficient intake of energy and nutrients to meet an individual’s needs to maintain good health.
Even as the Government through the Disaster Management and Mitigation Unit (DMMU) helps affected residents, at individual level, post-flooding coping mechanisms such as borrowing money, can perpetuate poverty among households.
In communities where understanding of the long-term health consequences of flooding and recurrent floods is even more limited, the impacts of flooding on nutritional health are likely to be quite severe especially among young children.
This is because multiple mechanisms explaining how floods may lead to poor nutrition in these settings are not well documented.
Tropical Storm Ana’s impact will no doubt bring a plethora of adverse conditions including food insecurity due to crop failure or food affordability due to sudden price changes.
Daily care of children and breastfeeding practices is importantly challenged during floods as in worst scenarios all basic services become disrupted, including water and sanitation conditions, or the provision of community basic health and social services.
In addition, diarrhoea or respiratory diseases, which occur at increased rates during or after flooding, have the potential to worsen child nutritional status.
Notably, most of the global burden of child undernutrition is clustered among rural and peri- urban areas.
Nutrition expert William Chilufya is worried that the quality of nutrition will be compromised as families cope with the aftermath of floods.
“These nutritional problems in children might be seriously aggravated by the augmented likelihood of extreme precipitation events and flooding due to climate change but also by increasing social and physical vulnerability to flood hazards,” he said.
Mr Chilufya added that in particular, children’s higher susceptibility to climate-related hazards coupled with climate-related food insecurity in many rural economies might increase the burden of disease due to flooding, jeopardizing human development of future generations.
He warns that sound evidence on the association of flooding and child nutrition is still rare and population-based studies are lacking.
Vice President WK Mutale Nalumango is on record assuring affected families that the Government will ensure that flood victims are cared for in the best possible way.
Going forward, loss of food stuffs in floods and household reliance on market purchase of food need to be identified as significant risk factors of post-flood household food insecurity.
In addition, households headed by educated people and households owning agricultural land may perhaps be found to be protective against post-flood food insecurity.
Therefore, post-flood emergency programmes, especially the food assistance programmes should be designed while prioritising these most food insecure groups instead of considering household poverty as the only selection criteria.
A multi-sectoral approach, which focuses on disaster risk reduction by taking into account the risk of disaster-induced food insecurity, will be essential as a long-term plan to reduce the vulnerability of affected communities.