Over 140,000 in need of urgent humanitarian assistance

Maputo, 25 Jul (AIM) – A total of 148,000 people in Mozambique are in an emergency situation and in need of urgent
humanitarian assistance, according to the National Council for Food and Nutritional Security.

According to Judite Mussácula, executive secretary of the Food and Nutritional Security Technical Secretariat (SETSAN), who was speaking on Thursday, in Maputo, on the sidelines of the sixth regular session of the National Council for Food and Nutritional Security, the people in question are living in 66 districts assessed by SETSAN.

“The research shows that, of the approximately two million people in the regions assessed, 144,000 are in an emergency situation and need support”, she said.

Mussacula added that in those regions 24,400 households were covered. She claimed that 114,000 children, aged between 6 and 59 months, “have been acutely malnourished in the last two months and need health care. We are making efforts to improve malnutrition indicators among children”.

Mussácula recalled that last June, the government launched a new food security strategy aimed at reducing chronic child malnutrition, which has been exacerbated by climate change in recent years.

For his part, Agriculture Minister Roberto Albino said that over the last ten years, the rate of chronic malnutrition among children under five years of age has fallen from 43 per cent in 2013 to the current 37 per cent, a level still considered as very high when compared to World Health Organization (WHO) recommendations.

“The government strategies are focused on healthy and nutritious agriculture on a scale that can solve the country’s food problem”, the minister said.
(AIM)
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