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Food Crisis: Living with hunger in Ethiopia

Living with hunger in Ethiopia

The food crisis in East Africa is worsening by the day. Families are becoming more desperate as they struggle to feed their children and face starvation. It is estimated that 403,000 children under five in Ethiopia need treatment for severe acute malnutrition. Access to water is also scarce and livestock are dying, making it incredibly hard for families to provide for themselves.

In a community in the Oromia region in Ethiopia, months have passed without rain. The main river has dried up and empty yellow jerry cans can be seen everywhere.

We spoke to mothers in the Oromia region of Ethiopia - here they tell us their daily struggles during one of the worst droughts to hit the region in decades.

Hade worries her children will die like her cows during the East Africa famine

The drought is very hard, we have lost our cattle, there is no food, no water and everything we had is gone. Now we need help, if not we are going to die soon like our cattle.

Hade, 40, mother of 11 children.

Lakame struggles to find water for her 2 year old baby suring one of the worst droughts in East Africa

Most of my neighbours have migrated in search of water, but I can’t. It took me a four hour round trip by foot to fetch the water that my child and me are drinking now.

Lakame, mother of a two-year-old baby

Beleko is struggling to feed her cattle during the food crisis in East Africa

As you can see, my 25th cow is now dying. Now I only have these three left and am counting the days until they die. There is no rain, no water, and the ground is nothing but dust. You can’t grow anything.

"I remember that there was a drought six years ago but this one is much worse than the previous one, I have never seen such drought in my life, the sun is too hot. We don’t have anything to eat or drink and it is the same for our cattle. We live on the small amount of food and water that the government is providing."

Beleko, 70, mother of four children

Woman waits by the road side waiting for a water delivery to arrive in Ethiopia

She [two-year-old child] started losing weight six month ago. Since then she has become severely ill. She is very weak and can’t eat, she vomits up everything she eats.

We used to give our children milk but now we don’t even have water let alone milk. What can I give her? We don’t have money to buy anything. We have no harvest and all our cattle has died.

Almaz Alemu, 38, mother of six children

In Ethiopia, we’re working in two of the regions most affected by the East Africa drought. We’re also reaching starving children in Kenya and South Sudan. Right now, over 16 million people across East Africa are in desperate conditions affected by the drought and facing hunger. Make a life-saving donation to help children on the brink of starvation in East Africa today.

Help starving children

Provide a life-saving donation to the East Africa food crisis

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