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Somalia: OER Director Paulsen visit

The acute food insecurity is on the rise in Somalia. By this September, people living in eight areas of the country could be experiencing famine, if livestock continues to die, key commodity prices rise further and humanitarian assistance fails to reach the most vulnerable, warned the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).

Duration 3m26s

Edit Version International

Video Type Video News Release (VNR)

Date 07/29/2022 1:40 PM

File size 497.96 MB

Unique ID UF2GE4

All editorial uses permitted

Production details and shotlist

UNFAO Source FAO Video

Shotlist TRT: 3:26

SOURCE: FAO /UNSOM

RESTRICTIONS: PLEASE CREDIT FAO AND UNSOM RESPECTIVELY ON SCREEN

LANGUAGE: ENGLISH /SOMALI /NATS

DATELINE: 15-27 JULY 2022, DOLOW /BAIDOA, SOMALIA

SHOTLIST

15 JULY 2022, DOLOW, SOMALIA

1. Wide shot, displaced with their belonging on carts moving towards camera

2. Wide shot, displaced passing by

3. Tracking shot, displaced children walking

4. Pan left, displaced with their belonging

5. SOUNDBITE (Somali) Hassan Abdul Koran, 38, displaced from Diinsoor:

“There was severe drought in the country and no rain. So, whatever we planted did not grow.”

6. Wide shot, displaced women and children sitting on the ground

7. Close up, baby drinking from cup

8. Med shot, Kusow sitting with her two children, talking

9. SOUNDBITE (Somali) Fatuma Adan Kusow, mother of two, displaced from Kolaban:

“When we finished our stock of food from the farm and animals started dying, we could not feed our children. We decided to flee because of hunger.”

10. Pan right, from one child in Fatuma’s lap to the other

27 JULY 2022, BAIDOA, SOMALIA

11. Wide shot, United Nations delegation in camp

12. Med shot, Paulsen and other directors talking to displaced

13. SOUNDBITE (English) Rein Paulsen, Director of the Office of Emergencies and Resilience, FAO:

“We were here because we are deeply concerned about the drought situation and how vulnerable households are being affected. I have just spoken with a family of seven. They came here seven months ago. They came here because their livestock had died. They came here because they had no means to survive in the rural areas. Where they were living was more than 100 kilometers away.”

14. Various shots, displaced women and children in camp

15. SOUNDBITE (English) Rein Paulsen, Director of the Office of Emergencies and Resilience, FAO:

“Our focus is very much on livelihoods. It is about providing cash to allow people to buy food to survive. It is about keeping the animals alive with emergency feeding, with vet treatments, with water supplies for animals in a drought context, which is super important. These are the practical types of activities we need to do.”

15 JULY 2022, DOLOW, SOMALIA

16. Wide shot, boy tying donkeys to a tree

17. Wide shot, boy walking from donkeys to family sitting on the ground

27 JULY 2022, BAIDOA, SOMALIA

18. SOUNDBITE (English) Rein Paulsen, Director of the Office of Emergencies and Resilience, FAO:

“So we absolutely have to scale up our response in rural areas to help the vulnerable people where they are. It is more effective, it is more humane. It is absolutely what we need to do as this collective scale up. But I have to say, the level of assistance that's being provided now is not what it needs to be. So we need multi-sectoral responses, supporting livelihoods. We do need a lot more funding from donors to come in to be able to do that.”

15 JULY 2022, DOLOW, SOMALIA

19. Wide shot, women sitting

20. Med shot, women sitting

21. Wide shot, huts in the camp

22. Med shot, children walking through camp

Script The acute food insecurity is on the rise in Somalia. By this September, people living in eight areas of the country could be experiencing famine, if livestock continues to die, key commodity prices rise further and humanitarian assistance fails to reach the most vulnerable, warned the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).

More than three million animals essential to Somalia’s pastoral and agro-pastoral communities have died so far and crop production has substantially dropped due to unprecedented poor rainfalls and intense dry conditions. Since the beginning of 2022, over 900,000 people were displaced due to the drought crisis.

Hassan Abdul Koran, 38-year-old farmer from Diinsoor, a town in the southwestern Bay region of Somalia, had no option but to flee home with his family, after losing all their livestock and crops. They came to Dolow, more than 300 km from their home, hoping to get some assistance.

“There was severe drought in the country and no rain. So, whatever we planted did not grow,” Koran said.

Fatuma Adan Kusow, mother of two from Kolaban, also in the Bay region, walked with her two children for more than 300 km, surviving on assistance from people living along the road.

“When we finished our stock of food from the farm and animals started dying, we could not feed our children. We decided to flee because of hunger,” she said.

The number of people in need of urgent humanitarian assistance has increased from 4.1 million at the start of 2022 to 7.1 million people between June and September 2022. In April, water and staple food prices rose by 140-160 percent above the five-year average in some areas.

To assess the situation for themselves and garner support for humanitarian response, the Inter-agency Standing Committee Emergency Directors Group visited the drought-affected areas in Somalia earlier this week.

Rein Paulsen, the FAO’s Emergencies and Resilience Director said the team is “deeply concerned about the drought situation and how vulnerable households are being affected.”

“I have just spoken with a family of seven. They came here seven months ago. They came here because their livestock had died. They came here because they had no means to survive in the rural areas. Where they were living was more than 100 kilometers away,” Paulsen said.

FAO is delivering assistance to rural areas, as closely as possible to affected communities which helps to keep families and communities together during crisis, reducing psychosocial and physical risks to the vulnerable, paving the way for a faster, future recovery.

“Our focus is very much on livelihoods,” Paulsen said. “It is about providing cash to allow people to buy food to survive. It is about keeping the animals alive with emergency feeding, with vet treatments, with water supplies for animals in a drought context, which is super important. These are the practical types of activities we need to do.”

In Somalia, for every single USD spent on supporting livelihoods for rural families through FAO’s programmes, ten USD can be saved in food-related assistance for a displaced family. While it costs USD 40 to buy a new goat, protecting a rural family’s livestock from drought-related diseases costs as little as forty cents per animal. Time-sensitive agricultural interventions are indispensable to the humanitarian response.

“So we absolutely have to scale up our response in rural areas to help the vulnerable people where they are. It is more effective, it is more humane. It is absolutely what we need to do as this collective scale up.”

FAO has reached 265 013 households between January and June this year with lifesaving and livelihood assistance, but the scale of assistance currently being delivered and funding from the international community is not yet sufficient to protect those most at risk. 

“The level of assistance that's being provided now is not what it needs to be,” Paulsen said. “So, we need multi-sectoral responses, supporting livelihoods. We do need a lot more funding from donors to come in to be able to do that.”

FAO Somalia urgently requires USD 131.4 million to assist 882,000 people across 55 districts with immediate lifesaving and livelihood safeguarding support. Funding levels remain drastically low, with the 2022 Somalia Humanitarian Response Plan (HRP) funded at just 19.2 percent as of 15 June 2022. FAO’s Drought Response Plan is currently just 18 percent funded.

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