Posted in Ag/Farming, Earthquake/CHOLERA

FAMINE THREATENS NORTHWEST AS UN DISTRIBUTES FOOD… MANY PEASANTS HAVE ALREADY EATEN THEIR SEED STOCKS AND HAVE NOTHING TO PLANT… GOVERNMENT CANNOT FIND CORN SEEDS TO REPLACE THOSE ALREADY LOST-Added COMMENTARY By Haitian-Truth

   March 27, 2014

By TRENTON DANIEL

Associated Press

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Aid workers in Haiti have begun distributing food to help some of the Caribbean nation’s poorest people cope with a severe drought, an official with a United Nations agency said Thursday.

The World Food Program on Wednesday began handing out cereal, vegetable oil and iodized salt to 10,000 people in towns in the northwestern peninsula of Haiti, WFP program chief Antoine Renard said.

Aid workers hope to reach 164,000 people with food by the end of the month, when the rainy season is due to begin. The goal is to hand out enough food to last at least a month so that farmers won’t be forced to eat their seeds, which would sabotage their ability to grow crops.

The Famine Early Warning Systems Network, a U.S.-government financed program that tracks weather patterns, agricultural production and food prices in an effort to offset famine, describes worrisome conditions for Haiti’s northwest.

Rains ended earlier than usual in October in the northwest and elsewhere along the northern coast, leading to the loss of sorghum, bean and corn crops.

The scarcity of water and an earlier and longer lean season will put families in a crisis category through June, the network reported. That category means that at least one in five households faces a food shortage, along with high or unusually acute malnutrition. People will need to sell off possessions to get by.

Haiti and its 10 million people are especially vulnerable to the whims of weather. A severe drought in 2012, also in the northwest, and the outer bands of Tropical Storm Isaac and Hurricane Sandy wiped out crops, causing many in Haiti to go hungry.

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The attached photograph is from an earlier famine in Haiti.
For the past several months, peasant organizations have warned of impending dangers. They have warned that peasants have eaten their seed stocks, in order to fight off hunger. Eating seed stocks is the last desperate step of people faced with famine.
The attached article suggests that the UN is distributing food to avert problems until the seeds are planted and crops grow to the point of harvest.
WHAT DO YOU DO IF THERE ARE NO SEEDS TO PLANT???!!!
This is a disaster in planning!!
The UN, OAS, MINUSTAH, Minister of Agriculture and a zillion other expensive high-priced groups should know that you arrange for new seed stock almost a year in advance. The seed companies then produce seeds to meet the demand. There is no point in overproducing seeds since seeds, sitting on the shelf, lose the fertility.
Old seeds produce less.
The Martelly/Lamothe government may face accelerating problems if this danger is not addressed.
$5,000,000 would have been better spent on seeds and schools instead of the Gonaives carnival. And now we are going to have a carnival in Jeremie!!
The Romans tried this approach in their Colloseum…. but, finally, their Mob rebelled and Rome fell.
This screw-up was predictable, and avoidable.
There may be no solution.
Shooting the Minister of Agriculture will simply add costs of a State Funeral to the budget.

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2 thoughts on “FAMINE THREATENS NORTHWEST AS UN DISTRIBUTES FOOD… MANY PEASANTS HAVE ALREADY EATEN THEIR SEED STOCKS AND HAVE NOTHING TO PLANT… GOVERNMENT CANNOT FIND CORN SEEDS TO REPLACE THOSE ALREADY LOST-Added COMMENTARY By Haitian-Truth”

  1. It is not as though this has not happened in the past.

    We have come to expect more from the Martelly-Lamothe team since they seem to have the peoples’ interests at heart. This was never the case with Aristide or Preval.

    Naming someone to the Cabinet does not guarantee success. A guy may hold a degree in agriculture but know absolutely nothing about the basic aspects of farming and the demands of each season.

    The need for seeds is predictable. The tons required is also a mathematical challenge that is not complex. The number of tons of fertilizer is also predictable.

    You can project the harvest with various rainfalls and sunny days.

    You can also project the results if you have no seeds to plant.

    ZERO – leading to major political problems and – perhaps – food riots.

  2. La Direction départementale agricole de l’Ouest (DDAO) du Ministère de l’Agriculture, des Ressources naturelles et du Développement rural (MARNDR) a bien compris l’importance de cette saison. Ainsi, elle a procédé, ce vendredi, à la distribution de semences de haricot à Kenscoff. Environ 500 paysans devaient en bénéficier. L’organisation paysanne Afè nèg combite (ANC) s’est convertie en canal de distribution à cette occasion afin de permettre à la DDAO d’atteindre les petits agriculteurs. Le fondateur de l’ANC, Antoine Occide Jean, dit père Sicot, a exprimé sa joie, révélant que désormais les paysans ne sont pas seuls. Le MARNDR a subventionné à hauteur de 75% la semence de haricot. Ce qui permet aux agriculteurs de l’acheter à un prix relativement bas lors de cette distribution commerciale. « La marmite de haricot se vend entre 200 et 250 gourdes. Toutefois, les semences sont plus coûteuses. Cela n’empêche pas le paysan de payer la marmite de semence au prix de 50 gourdes. Nous avons mis à leur disposition environ 1 500 kilogrammes de semences. Cette quantité couvrira environ 70 hectares », a fait savoir l’agronome Arnoux Severin, titulaire de la DDAO, soulignant que les semences sont traitées avec des insecticides. De ce fait, elles ne sont pas destinées à la consommation mais plutôt à la terre. La majorité des bénéficiaires de ces semences se montrent satisfaits et disent attendre la saison des pluies pour commencer à mettre les semences en terre. C’est une bonne opportunité pour eux. « Je devais avoir au moins cinq cents gourdes pour acheter cette quantité de semences. Je l’ai presque gratuitement aujourd’hui. Je vais payer l’écolage de mes enfants avec l’argent que j’avais économisé pour acheter ces semences », se réjouit un bénéficiaire. Un autre bénéficiaire qui a répondu aux questions des journalistes a, pour sa part, affirmé qu’il ne va pas tarder aussi à mettre ses semences en terre. Ensuite, il a dit qu’il attend la distribution de l’engrais pour pouvoir fertiliser son sol d’ici le mois d’avril. En ce qui concerne l’engrais, l’agronome Arnoux Severin a annoncé que le gouvernement a aussi subventionné ce produit. Il a même communiqué le prix du sac. « Avec seulement 900 gourdes, vous aurez l’opportunité d’acheter un sac d’engrais », a déclaré aux paysans de Kenscoff celui qui mène la barque de la DDAO. Cette nouvelle a comblé de joie le fondateur de l’ANC. « Sans la paysannerie, il n’y aura pas de développement. Les paysans quittent la campagne parce qu’ils ne peuvent pas acheter des semences et des engrais pour travailler la terre. Aujourd’hui, les paysans ne sont pas abandonnés à leur triste sort», a déclaré Antoine Occide Jean, soulignant que la DDAO est fidèle dans son rôle d’accompagnement aux paysans de Kenscoff. Ensuite, il a rappelé que dans cette commune le secteur agricole a bénéficié d’un centre de conditionnement de fruits et de légumes et d’une caisse populaire qui accorde le crédit agricole aux paysans.

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