Recent Events and the Problem of Food Security 1998-2000 :

Ethiopia has been struggling to reduce the impact of man-made and natural-disasters since the middle of 1998. The war with Eritrea, which started on May 12, 1998, and the continued failure of the belg rains since the onset of La Niña in the summer of 1998 had made Ethiopia vulnerable to man-made and natural disasters. 

Drought created fodder, food and water shortages in the nomadic areas of the Somali Regional State and killed sheep, goats and camels. In March and April 2000, the situation reached a pre-famine state and the international community intervened again. The Ethiopian government had been requesting donors for relief since 1999 (?) but they were reluctant give new pledges or even repay their loans from the Ethiopian Food Reserve Administration (EFRA). Ethiopia released a report about the status of the food reserve which had fallen to its lowest. The report included a list of the donor countries that borrowed from the food Security Reserve Administration for their projects but failed to return. The donors undermined the original objective of having a strategic food reserve for an emergency response.

 The war with Eritrea began on May 12, 1998, over a dispute as to the location of the international boundary between Ethiopia and Eritrea, when Eritrea occupied a few districts in northern Ethiopia that it claimed as its own. The conflict led to the internal displacement of over 350, 000 Ethiopians who became dependent on food aid.

The belg rains were absent for the years 1998-2000 inclusive, because of the persisting La Niña that began in July 1998. This reduced food output in the belg producing areas and reduced the plantation of long maturing crops for the Meher season.  The impact of the absence of precipitation during the last three-belg seasons was mainly on the pastoral areas of Ethiopia. These pastoral lands receive their rainfall during the belg seasons. The herders in the Ogaden have lost their cattle, camel and goats due to the drought.

The war with Eritrea disrupted Ethiopia’s access to the ports of Massawa and Assab to import its relief and commercial goods. When the war erupted, Eritrea confiscated 70,000 MT of food aid destined for Ethiopia, of which 45, 000 MT was from the USAID (Washington Times). There was an increase in the number of needy people because of the displacement of more than 350,000 Ethiopians from the Eritrean occupied zones of Badme, Zalambessa and Burrie in Tigray and Afar regions.

In the last two years, food stocks in the EFRS (Ethiopian Food Security Reserves) were depleted because of the slowness of the donors to repay the grains they had borrowed. There are two possible reasons for the slowness of the donors to repay their loans. First, food production in 1996 and 1998 in Ethiopia was at a record high, creating the impression that Ethiopia did not need external aid. If this was true, Ethiopia’s success in its agricultural production worked against itself. Second, there is the theory that donors might have used food as a political weapon, to push Ethiopia to accept peace proposals that were unfair, in order to stop the war at any cost.

The impact of La Niña that replaced the 1997-98 El Niño in July 1998 has been visible. According to the NMSA, La Niña increases rainfall during the Kiremt and decreases the small rains during the belg. Thus, the persistent La Niña that started in 1998 had impacted negatively, particularly on the pastoral areas of Ethiopia.

The discussions in this report show that ENSO information has been useful to forecast the Kiremt and belg rainfalls in Ethiopia. Such forecasts are helpful for an early intervention on the part of the government and donors. The success of the proposed interventions in response to the disasters depends on the preparedness of the country for the impact.  There can be an optimal preparedness and response to climate-related disasters if there is sustained economic growth, peace, stability and good governance in the country. The recent events also showed the vulnerability of the society to small social and climate-related perturbations.