Poor 2009/10 harvest in Sahelian pastoral and agro-pastoral belts of West Africa
The poor distribution of rains during the 2009 season in the Sahelian zone of West Africa's eastern market basin resulted in poor millet production in northeastern Mali, Niger, northeastern Burkina Faso, far northern Nigeria, and central Chad, shown as belownormal vegetation in Figure 1. Throughout these regions, production of millet, the staple food for these regions, is likely to be 30 percent below average, creating a significant deficit in these areas. The recent CILSS/FEWS NET/FAO/WFP crop assessments conclude that with the significant surpluses of sorghum, maize, and rice harvested in the southern parts of Sahelian countries and the Gulf of Guinea states, food availability in West Africa will be sufficient to meet needs, provided markets are allowed to function normally. However, poor access to food via markets will increase needs for assistance in these areas, particularly in Niger and Chad.
The provisional cereal production for 2009/2010 for the Sahel (excluding Mali), 11.250.000 MT, is normal, though 16 percent below last year's. The substantial decrease in production regionally is due almost entirely to the aforementioned millet crop failures. Millet prices are near the nominally record highs of this time last year on key retail reference markets in Chad, Mali, and Niger. With the below-normal production, millet prices are likely to rise unseasonably during the January – March post-harvest period, three months earlier than normal, as households begin to supplement reserves with market purchases. Rates of acute malnutrition are likely to increase abnormally as households spend a greater proportion of income on high-calorie cereals and less on high-priced proteins. As prices for millet rise, households that prefer millet will to begin to switch consumption to lower-cost sorghum, maize, tubers, and rice, increasing competition for these goods between human, industrial, and animal consumption. For example, the high price and scarcity of animal feeds will likely increase the demand for maize as an alternative feed, further crowding-out human consumption and raising prices for market-dependent households during the extended April-August hunger season.
To attract cereal flows from the south, prices in the north will rise earlier and more steeply than normal. Purchasing power is expected to be limited in the region this year due to significant reductions in cowpea and groundnut production, which constitute a major source of revenue for poor, particularly in southern Niger and far northern Nigeria, as well as by the poor pasture conditions, which are expected to result in below-normal cereal – livestock terms of trade as of January. In spite of early and extended labor migration, challenges in accessing food will generate widespread moderate food insecurity in the northern Sahel throughout the marketing season with localized pockets of highly food insecure populations as of April among northern pastoralists and agro-pastoralists in the eastern market basin, particularly Niger.
Although food access will be supported by high demand for migrant labor in main cities, strong incentives for off-season market gardening, and favorable exchange rates for importing cereals from coastal countries between October and March, households are beginning to erode their asset bases in anticipation of access difficulties once these coping strategies meet their limits in April. As such, widespread moderate food insecurity is expected until March. As of April, declining food stocks, rising cereal prices, and falling livestock prices will reduce household purchasing power, causing pockets of locally high food insecurity, especially among agro-pastoral and pastoral households, through the end of the hunger season in August 2010. The areas affected by significant production deficits need immediate assistance to encourage off-season production, as well as support to rebuild community cereal and animal feed banks. Every effort should be made to ensure the free movement of cereals across borders, and industrial and government cereal procurement should take place before January in order to benefit from the lowest prices and to avoid disturbing prices as households increase market purchases.
