Over a million farming households face acute food shortage in Zambia, warns Oxfam 

In Zambia, over one million people from families practising agriculture face acute food shortages and malnutrition, warned Oxfam, a global organisation that fights inequality to end poverty and injustice.

The extreme food shortage will continue into the next growing season which is a year away, the organisation projected,

Between October 2023 and March 2024, 2.04 million people were already classified in crisis levels of food insecurity or worse and required urgent humanitarian action to reduce food gaps, protect and restore livelihood and prevent acute malnutrition.

A severe drought, worsened by climate change and El Nino has caused massive crop failures for half of the nation’s planted area.

It affected eight provinces across the country, with highest impacts in Southern, Central, Eastern, North-western, Western and Lusaka Provinces.

The country started experiencing the dry spells from January 20, 2024. This has impacted most of the central and southern half of the country, that has received less than normal rainfall, leaving one million hectares of maize destroyed, almost half of the country’s maize cultivation.

Zambia President Hakainde Hichilema declared the country’s debilitating drought a national disaster and emergency on February 29, 2024.

In response to the presidential declaration of the drought, national disaster and emergency in Zambia, the United Nations is working with the government in preparing a drought response plan to support affected households in 84 severely affected districts across seven provinces.

Beatrice Mutali, UN resident coordinator in Zambia, said:

With the drought response plan, we expect the government to launch a humanitarian appeal that we hope will enable us to mobilise about $30 million to provide humanitarian support, livelihoods recovery and resilience building for the over 1 million households of which a significant number are children, at risk of food insecurity, acute malnutrition and disease.

To provide a comprehensive response for children and families in Zambia, UNICEF is currently seeking about $11 million for immediate lifesaving efforts as well as longer-term programmes to strengthen existing systems in the country to be more resilient to future climate challenges.

Yvonne Chibiya, Oxfam in Zambia Country Representative, said Oxfam and partners are doing further assessments in the targeted districts to inform the humanitarian response. 

Oxfam urgently needs 6 million euros to provide 600,000 people with cash transfers and clean water, help with winter cropping and improve local sanitation and hygiene services to prevent a resurgence of cholera outbreak.