{"id":2912,"date":"2024-08-20T01:46:30","date_gmt":"2024-08-20T01:46:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sbmediaonline.com\/?p=2912"},"modified":"2024-08-20T01:46:31","modified_gmt":"2024-08-20T01:46:31","slug":"sadc-reports-over-67-million-people-affected-by-severe-drought-in-southern-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sbmediaonline.com\/?p=2912","title":{"rendered":"SADC reports over 67 million people affected by severe drought in Southern Africa&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"300\" height=\"166\" src=\"https:\/\/uwordpressmedia.blob.core.windows.net\/uwordpressmedia01\/2024\/08\/61291547.295.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2913\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>About 68 million people in Southern Africa are suffering the effects of an El Nino-induced drought which has wiped out crops across the region, the regional bloc SADC said on Saturday.<br><br>The drought, which started in early 2024, has hit crop and livestock production, causing food shortages and damaging the wider economies.<br><br>Heads of state from the 16-nation Southern African Development Community (SADC) were meeting in Zimbabwe&#8217;s capital Harare to discuss regional issues including food security.<br><br>Some 68 million people, or 17 percent of the region&#8217;s population, are in need of aid, said Elias Magosi, SADC executive secretary.<br><br>&#8220;The 2024 rainy season has been a challenging one with most parts of the region experiencing negative effects of the El Nino phenomenon characterised by the late onset of rains,&#8221; he said.<br><br>It is Southern Africa&#8217;s worst drought in years, owing to a combination of naturally occurring El Nino &#8211; when an abnormal warming of the waters in the eastern Pacific changes world weather patterns &#8211; and higher average temperatures produced by greenhouse gas emissions.<br><br>Countries including Zimbabwe, Zambia, and Malawi have already declared the hunger crisis a state of disaster, while Lesotho and Namibia have called for humanitarian support.<br><br>The region launched an appeal in May for $5.5 billion in humanitarian assistance to support the drought response, but donations have not been forthcoming, said outgoing SADC chair Joao Lourenco, President of Angola.<br><br>&#8220;The amount mobilised so far is unfortunately below the estimated amounts and I would like to reiterate this appeal to regional and international partners to redouble their efforts&#8230; to help our people who have been affected by El Nino,&#8221; he told the summit.<br><br>The drought is a major talking point at this year&#8217;s summit, alongside issues such as the ongoing conflict in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, which Lourenco said was a source of great concern.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>About 68 million people in Southern Africa are suffering the effects of an El Nino-induced drought which has wiped out crops across the region, the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2913,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2912","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sbmediaonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2912","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sbmediaonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sbmediaonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sbmediaonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sbmediaonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2912"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sbmediaonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2912\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2914,"href":"https:\/\/sbmediaonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2912\/revisions\/2914"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sbmediaonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2913"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sbmediaonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2912"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sbmediaonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2912"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sbmediaonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2912"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}