Africa Drought and Famine Fund

It has been over a year since the UN announced the largest humanitarian crisis in the world since 1945: the drought and famine which has wreaked havoc on millions throughout East Africa, Yemen, and northeast Nigeria.

Luckily our nonprofit partners have donors like you. With your generous support, our partners on the ground reached affected communities with life-saving relief services. The situation in East Africa has improved dramatically with the help of our GlobalGiving partners, other relief entities, and abundant rainfall in March and April, which makes this a good time to celebrate the accomplishments of our partners.

One organization mounted a unique response to an overlooked issue that sometimes arises when children flee from drought and resulting resource conflict in their communities. The drought hit northern Kenya harder than any other region of the country. Child Rescue Kenya (CRK), an NGO that focuses on reintegrating children living on the streets back into their families in the western Kenya city of Kitale, had to pivot their operations to accommodate the new arrivals of children due to the drought. These children were exposed to drugs, poor diet, and abuse in a city that was foreign to them. CRK stepped up and scaled up. Their social workers traveled throughout Kitale to identify new arrivals on the street and refer them to their short-term or long-term centers, depending on the specific need of the child. CRK staff then visited and provided resources to children’s families, such as business grants or bio-intensive agriculture training, which is particularly important to build resilience and take advantage of limited resources and rainfall. If there’s no family in the picture, CRK provides long-term, holistic services, such as education and housing.

World Vision reached over 3.1 million people in East Africa with food and livelihood assistance. Concern Worldwide was able to recently make cash transfers to 1,606 vulnerable households in southern Somalia, a region dealing with significant food insecurity.

Thank you again for standing with people affected by drought and famine, and for making the smart choice to donate in support of community-led disaster recovery efforts.

Warmly, 
Andrew Denu + the GlobalGiving Team

Happy New Year, and thank you for supporting those suffering from the devastating effects of food crises. Your donation has allowed GlobalGiving partners to address the effects of famine and drought in their communities in a myriad of ways—from loaning goats to vulnerable families to providing emergency hygiene education to halt the spread of cholera.

Since last March, when drought conditions in Africa and the Middle East led to the declaration of the largest humanitarian crisis in 70 years, progress has been made, thanks to the unrelenting work of our nonprofit partners and generous support from donors like you, who’ve raised more than $130,000 so far.

We’re proud that GlobalGiving’s nonprofit partners allow communities to become agents of their own recovery. Take the work being done in South Sudan and Yemen, for example.

While South Sudan is no longer technically experiencing a famine, 5.1 million people are at risk of being classified as severely food insecure between January and March of 2018. With climate-related events such as droughts expected to continue into this year and beyond, relief efforts must shift their focus from community dependence on short-term humanitarian assistance to long-term recovery. Alaska Sudan Medical Project in Old Fangak, South Sudan uses the model of “farm aid, not food aid” in order to build resilience and equip communities with the agricultural tools to cope with, adapt to, and manage future droughts. They’re strengthening their communities by providing farmers with holistic farming training, drought-resistant seeds, and micro-loans for large farming equipment to scale up farm production.

In Yemen, the ongoing political and military crisis is wreaking havoc on the lives of millions of people. Humanitarian assistance has been cut off to many areas of the country, resulting in chronic shortages of food and medicine, especially in the most remote areas. The Yemeni people are relying on a crumbling health system in the midst of recent cholera and diphtheria outbreaks. In response, Relief International has deployed local mobile medical teams to remote areas of Yemen, where they are treating cases of childhood malnutrition, providing family planning services, and distributing hygiene kits to help families protect themselves against disease. After seeing the impact these efforts have had, local authorities across Yemen have recently recommended all other relief agencies start mimicking the structure and modality of Relief International’s mobile medical teams in hard to reach areas.

The fight is far from over, however. For many in South Sudan, Yemen, Somalia, and northeast Nigeria, 2018 will bring more of the what they experienced in 2017: violent conflict, economic instability, and more climatic shocks. Millions will enter this new year teetering on the brink of famine. The situation in each of the affected countries is unique and we trust our nonprofit partners who have been working in this region for years to be in the best position to nimbly respond as their local circumstances demand.

We’ll continue to update you on our partners' progress in the months to come. Thank you again for your generosity, and for deciding to support community-led organizations in response to this ongoing humanitarian crisis.

Warmly,
Andrew Denu + the GlobalGiving Team

Today is World Food Day! Your donation has done so much amazing work, but the fight against hunger is not over. All donations to organizations responding to famine and drought in East Africa, northeast Nigeria, and Yemen will be matched 100% by GlobalGiving while funds remain.

Meet Hodan and Achan. They are just two of the people you have helped during this time of famine and drought. Please consider amplifying your impact by donating to one of these projects to help others like Hodan and Achan.

Hodan (pictured above)
Home: Somaliland

Hodan has to care for her baby girl, and she relies on her livestock for food and income. Like many mothers in Somaliland, Hodan has to walk miles to fetch water for her household. She faces the long trek with her daughter on her back. “If the drought continues, I am scared my daughter might die. All the parents have that fear that if the drought continues their babies could die from hunger or shortage of water,” says Hodan. Sometimes, Hodan skips meals so that her daughter can eat. Recently, she partnered with ActionAid to cut out the taxing journey for water. ActionAid provides food and water to her and 400 vulnerable families in her community. They distribute rice, flour, dates, sugar, oil, powdered milk, and more to ensure that mothers like Hodan can care for themselves and their children.

Achan (pictured below)
Home: South Sudan

Achan is a widow who had eight children. Seven of her children died during the ongoing war in her home country of South Sudan, and Achan was left to care for her orphaned grandchildren. Before the war, she was a subsistence farmer who sustained her big family with what she was able to grow. When the war broke out in her community, she and her family ran to save their lives, leaving all their belongings and crops behind. She believes her home has been destroyed by the rebels. Today, Achan lives in a refugee camp in Uganda. Hope Orifiha is helping her and other refugees rebuild their lives with medical care, microfinance options, and educational programs.

Click here to read more stories from the famine or learn about innovations in hunger relief.

Thank you for doing your part in the fight to end hunger! Donate now and get matched!

Warmly,

Andrew + the GlobalGiving team

Millions are living on the brink of starvation across East Africa, Yemen, and north-east Nigeria. While this crisis isn’t receiving much media attention, you are making a difference in the lives of those suffering from this humanitarian emergency. Your donation has supported eight organizations responding to the food security crises in South Sudan, Somalia, Kenya, and Ethiopia. Read more about the grants made below:

1. Seed Programs International (pictured above) is supporting local school and household level gardening through the distribution of seeds, tools, and agriculture supplies in famine-affected areas of Africa.
2. Horn of Africa Development Initiative is partnering with more than 100 communities in Kenya to provide thousands with water tanks and unconditional monthly cash transfers during the crisis.
3. Alaska Sudan Medical Project is providing quality seeds and irrigation pumps in order to stabilize yield, reduce the risk of harvest failure, and increase productivity of high value crops.
4. Kids for Kids is providing goat loans to vulnerable families in Darfur, South Sudan to supply milk to malnourished children immediately.
5. Child Rescue Kenya is reintegrating children and young people—who have been displaced by drought and have ended up on the streets—with their families, while offering immediate relief in the meantime.
6. Hope Health Action is providing emergency food aid and agriculture support to people currently displaced within South Sudan.
7. IsraAID is distributing nutritional supplements to vulnerable children in South Sudan and combating gender-based violence in that region.
8. Concern Worldwide US is providing unconditional cash transfers to households via mobile money systems in Somalia.

Thank you for supporting those suffering from the devastating effects of the famine in East Africa. We’ll update you in the coming months on the positive change these organizations are having on the lives of many East Africans. There are still opportunities to give to this cause and there will be a campaign on October 16th for World Food Day for all our partners responding to food shortages around the world. Thank you for doing your part in the fight to end hunger!

The world is facing the largest humanitarian crises in 70 years and less than one in five of all Americans are aware. 20 million people are facing extreme hunger, but with your relentless support, our partners on the ground can reach their communities to save lives.

In South Sudan, farming communities have been driven from their homes, leaving fields unharvested, animals stranded, and food prices soaring. Lack of access to clean water increases the threat of diseases like cholera, an illness that has already penetrated Yemen. In Somalia alone, 6.7 million people require humanitarian assistance. Since the announcement of this crisis in March, our partners have been responding quickly. For example:

• Aktion Deutschland Hilft e.V. (pictured above) is working in South Sudan to boost food security by promoting better farming practices and animal health through education and access to resources, such as medicine for cattle.
• International Medical Corps is working to increase Somalia's access to clean water through the distribution of water purification tablets, hygiene kits, and storage containers. Also, they are planning to respond to cholera in Yemen by providing emergency hygiene education.
• Kids for Kids is providing goat loans to vulnerable families in Darfur, South Sudan to supply milk to malnourished children immediately.

This fund is directly supporting organizations that can nimbly and effectively provide for immediate and long-term community needs. The crisis is far from over and we must continue to scale up our response through sustainable livelihood and agricultural projects, or else any progress made will be rapidly undone. Thank you once again for being a part of this global community of support for a neglected group of suffering people. We look forward to sharing more stories from the ground in the coming weeks.

Warmly,

Andrew + the GlobalGiving team