East Africa drought: Africa must do more to help itself. International aid for the starving millions is needed because regional governments don't do enough, says Mike Pflanz.

By Mike Pflanz – The Telegraph, UK

The drought now blighting the vast, arid basin of land that stretches from northern Kenya through central Somalia and into eastern Ethiopia is among the worst anyone has seen. Some regions are drier than they have been since 1951. No rain at all has fallen for more than a year in some places, and recent showers in others were half what would be expected.

Desperate people stumbling into camps and towns to find help are so malnourished that statistics reported to aid offices in Nairobi were at first not believed. "We sent them back because we thought they were wrong," says one senior aid official in Kenya's capital, the de facto centre of the current drought response.

In some areas of northern Kenya, 37 per cent of the population need emergency feeding. Across the Horn of Africa, levels of 20 per cent, 25 per cent and 30 per cent are being recorded regularly – double the 15 per cent emergency threshold.

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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/8616965/East-Africa-drought-Africa-must-do-more-to-help-itself.html