According to the NGO Oxfam, around 4.6 million people in Guatemala face food insecurity, and their situation is also threatened by the effects of the El Niño phenomenon, which in recent years has led to losses in corn and bean crops essential to the The country’s livelihoods are essential to vulnerable families. The official climate outlook indicates a “significantly high probability” that El Niño could form between May and July. The phenomenon is characterized by extreme conditions: high temperatures and drought or floods that mainly affect the Dry Corridor, a semi-arid region of Central America more prone to drought or floods depending on the behavior of rainfall. So far, the state weather service has forecast a “normal” rainy season.
However, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) believes that the mere presence of El Niño poses a threat to agriculture, regardless of its intensity. Weak phenomena have caused significant losses in agriculture. In 2018, it caused prolonged heat waves and no rain for up to 40 days, resulting in a $44 million loss in corn production, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
“Climatic conditions are rather an additional aggravating factor for inequality, exclusion and the lack of productive economic policies to promote the development of people living in poverty, mainly those living in rural areas,” claims Rafael University researcher Landívar Raúl Maas.
Rural areas are reporting an increase in cases of acute malnutrition, and on April 23, health officials confirmed the deaths of six children under the age of two as a result of nutritional deficiencies, two of whom had clinical signs of kwashiorkor. In 2022, according to official figures, 18 children under the age of five died from acute malnutrition.
By mid-April, there was an increase of 2,287 (44%) cases of acute malnutrition year-on-year, according to reports from the Ministry of Health’s National Food and Nutrition Safety Information System (Siinsan). Cases of malnutrition are increasing, especially in areas that have reported damage from El Niño.
“Populations that are already in a situation of precarious food insecurity and need the support of the state and other actors to access basic foodstuffs will be affected by the El Niño phenomenon,” says Iván Aguilar of Oxfam Central America. The Department of Agriculture has programs for farm insurance, grants and improved seeds with a budget of nearly $20 million this year.
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The magnitude and territorial scope of El Niño’s impacts are unknown, but when lessons from other years are taken into account, we know that the dry corridor will be one of the regions with the greatest complications, he adds. The Dry Corridor covers 10% of the entire territory of Guatemala, 80% of its inhabitants live in poverty and 30% in extreme poverty. This region, like other parts of the country, lacks water supplies and access to health and education services is limited, and in many cases they are provided by humanitarian agencies.
Antigua Al Rescate (AAR) is one of the organizations supporting arid corridor families living in food insecurity. Its mobile nutrition restoration program benefits approximately 278 families each month, each with one to three underweight children. “We are in the worst time of the year, very hot and facing a drought or landslide scenario due to the rains,” warns AAR’s Sofía Letona.
Politicians and hunger
The political campaign, heading into the June 25 general election, is bringing some relief to some communities in poverty. Some parties give away food, supplies, or money that provide relief to families who, for example, can’t raise $30 to buy two cans of powdered milk that will feed a baby for a month, Letona says. In its report this week, the Guatemalan Election Observation Mission reported on two cases of food deliveries that were part of election campaign activities related to community social programs in which public officials participated.
Aguilar anticipates the greatest impacts will be seen in late 2023 and into next year, when reserves of staple grains are depleted and low yields or crop losses are experienced. The loss of corn and beans puts rural families at risk, especially considering the price of corn has doubled in the last five years.
The deterioration in living conditions will coincide with the replacement of the government in Guatemala, which entails a deepening of institutional weaknesses to respond to the needs of the population, says Letona, as each government changes many of the technical staff already known to meet the needs of the country and how the welfare programs work.
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