Ethiopia - Borana Drought Relief

Yooyyaa | Greetings!

My name is Elias Mulugeta Hordofa and I am a journalist with the BBC based in Nairobi, Kenya.

But I am here not as a media professional, but rather as a concerned member of the community in Ethiopia, and this is my first-ever crowdfunding initiative.

Communities across East Africa are experiencing the worst drought in 40 years, and the disaster is beyond description - affecting people's lives, livestock, and wildlife.

According to Reliefweb, an estimated 3.5 million livestock have died between late 2021 and mid-May 2022.

So I am here asking for your help. We will use the funds to help families survive these worst days. Even if we support a dozen households with basic needs like rice, wheat, cooking oil, sugar... and fodder for their remaining cows (if they have any).

I will pass the funds to a trusted grassroots charity and report how we have used your money.

(Image above: wildlife in Borana National Park coming to villages in search of water and pasture, and also dying.)

Background (reliefweb.int):

Over the recent years, drought-affected pastoralist and agro-pastoralist communities in southern and eastern Ethiopia have suffered from the impact of multiple and often recurring shocks.

In addition to four back-to-back failed rainy seasons since late 2020 (the worst in the last 40 years), these communities have endured the impact of desert locust infestations, conflict and disease outbreaks, including COVID-19 pandemic and previous droughts episodes notably in 2017 and 2011.

Likewise, the expansion and continuation of the drought has not only affected more people, it has also increased significantly the severity of their needs and eroded any remaining resilience mechanisms almost completely.

In addition, the drought has expanded to areas that have also been affected by conflict in Northern Ethiopia, notably in Afar region, or violence in other part of the country, notably in Oromia and SNNP regions, subjecting affecting people to increase vulnerability.

(above: in May last year I supported a few households who were struggling financially)

“For communities in Borena, their survival is closely linked with their cattle. They depend on them. Loss of cattle means loss of livelihood. Even the price of cattle dropped because their condition deteriorated significantly.”

Below are a few articles from aid agencies showing the magnitude of the problem: