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Reports of Davide Naggi, Kenya, October 2011
cbm's Davide Naggi reporting from the food crisis in the Horn of Africa
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Davide Naggi is cbm’s Emergency Programme Manager - Horn of Africa.
He is a physiotherapist by training who has been involved in humanitarian work since early 1999.
A chest injury caused by a hand grenade explosion in Rwanda in 2000 renewed his passion for working with war and disasters affected persons.
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Davide Naggi
Emergency Programme Manager - Horn of Africa |
As the Emergency Programme Manager based in Kenya, one of my duties is be in touch with the partners working in the field on a regular basis. This is to develop a better understanding of the interventions, to suggest and guide changes whenever required and to guarantee a proper utilisation of the resources which - thanks to our supporters - have been provided by cbm.
Additionally, as a team, we follow-up and analyse the development of the situation through several ways such as reading and analysing the information shared by the international humanitarian forums, through meetings and exchange of updates with other implementing organisations and most importantly through field missions carried out by the CBM Team.
The food distributed by cbm and its partners since August 2011 provided a crucial support to thousands of disadvantaged families during the hardest periods of the food crisis. For example, in the Tharaka District of Kenya, which is one of the areas covered by the cbm food relief program, it is estimated that half of the population is in need of food aid. Furthermore, this area has one of the highest incidences of poverty and the highest prevalence of disability within the country.
Despite the fact that most of the population within the drought affected areas is in need of support, cbm felt that it was important to look for the most vulnerable and at risk within the targeted communities. For this reason, food aid was provided above all to those households with persons with disabilities, children with disability, children under five, pregnant and lactating mothers, elderly people, and with family members affected by chronic diseases.
This approach provoked some interesting reactions, such as a family finally disclosing the presence of a disabled child within their household. Local communities and tribal groups have different cultural attitudes toward families who have children with disability and children with disabilities themselves. These attitudes are generally associated to poor literacy, lack of awareness, local beliefs and many other reasons. The need of food and the targeting of children with disability encouraged families to move outside the confinement of the household, to the food relief sites. Although this response was induced by a necessity, it was an opening which cbm used to pass important messages about disability inclusion and rights for children with disability. That said, attitudinal and cultural changes do not happen overnight and meticulous work is still needed.
Another issue which we noticed during our work is that, as well as persons with disability, mothers of children with disability face a number of extra challenges during an emergency and during the follow up aid interventions. One simple but very common example is the distance they have to cover, often walking for hours from their village to the distribution sites.
The needs and challenges faced by persons with disability and their families remain a specific focus for cbm, especially in times of emergency, when their lives may be at risk if they don’t get enough support.
This is why mobility devices such as wheelchairs, crutches and walkers have been distributed through a partner to persons with disability living in the refugee camps located in eastern Kenya (currently the largest refugee camps in the world) that hosts half a million Somali people. This simple intervention is crucial to guarantee access to important programmes such as food relief and provision of health services (including immunisation and screening) within the camps.
The partnership with the Kenya Red Cross has been developed along the same lines, so that persons with disability become a specific focus within their relief activities in the areas of health and food relief. Such a partnership is a way for cbm to maximise the impact of aid in favour of persons with disability.
The context and nature of the problem is changing week by week. Therefore a more flexible approach is required. On one side we have to deal with the effects of the drought (food-shortage) and continue to provide relief during the next months. On the other hand, we need to empower the community so as to reduce their level of vulnerability as they will be more capable to face such challenges in the future. This is done through the provision of seeds and agricultural tools so that fields can be ready for the upcoming rainy season. The quantity and quality of the next harvests will be crucial. If farmers will have good harvest during the first trimester of next year, they will have food to face the months to come and be able to wait until the next rainy season. Additionally we train people in water harvesting and micro irrigation.
Building up the capacities of the local community to cope with the current situation and to get ready for possible new crises is efficient and proves very cost-effective. We believe that supporting disadvantaged people to go through the food-crisis and helping them to regain their autonomy and dignity is good use of our supporters’ money.
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