Image depicting Emergency In Zimbabwe
Photo: WFP/David Orr

Emergency In Zimbabwe

Unprecedented drought and a tumbling economy have left half the population without enough food

Full-Blown Humanitarian Crisis

Zimbabwe’s hunger emergency is driven by climate change and economic collapse. It has the highest inflation rate in the world and is gripped by drought. There are fuel shortages, widespread poverty, a lack of clean drinking water, power outages, and now coronavirus on top of it.

Today, 7.7 million people are in the throes of hunger. WFP is rapidly ramping up its emergency assistance to reach as many as 4.1 million of the hardest hit families.

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The country's corn production has been reduced by 50% this year

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Two of the capital's four reservoirs are empty due to lack of rain

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70% of children under the age of two suffer from anemia

A Crisis out of Control

Extreme Weather

Zimbabwe is in the grips of back-to-back climate-related disasters. First, Cyclone Idai struck in March of this year, causing massive flooding and landslides. Now, six months later, in a cruel irony, the country is facing extreme drought in the middle of peak farming season. “We are facing a drought unlike any that we have seen in a long time,” said WFP’s Executive Director David Beasley. “We are talking about people who truly are marching towards starvation if we are not here to help them.”

Photo: WFP/Sophia Robele

Currency Shortage

Zimbabwe is suffering from a severe cash crunch, with a near total lack of physical currency. The government passed legislation in June 2019 banning the use of the U.S. dollar for local transactions and instead implemented the Zimbabwe Dollar (ZWL) as the only acceptable national currency. Retailers are struggling to buy basic food imports because the vast majority of suppliers won’t accept the ZWL. People’s faith in the new currency as well as their purchasing power is massively depleted as prices increase at a rate not seen in over a decade.

Photo: Waldo Swiegers/Bloomberg

Economic Crisis

A severe economic crisis is adding to people’s misery. It’s caused inflation to skyrocket and the value of Zimbabwe’s currency to plummet. Over the last decade, the country has experienced a number of similarly crippling economic, environmental and political upsets. These challenges make Zimbabwe’s food security situation alarming – it ranks 107 out of 119 countries on the 2018 Global Hunger Index.

Photo: WFP/David Orr

Malnutrition

Micronutrient deficiencies are prevalent throughout Zimbabwe, including a 70 percent prevalence of anemia among children under the age of two, largely driven by poor dietary diversity. Eight of Zimbabwe’s 59 districts have acute malnutrition rates over five percent, which is unprecedented.

Photo: WFP/Jonathan Dumont

Poor Harvests

A poor harvest in 2014-2015, a historic drought in 2015-2016, and the second-worst cyclone on record in 2019 have brought the agricultural sector to its knees. The consequences for the population are dire, chiefly because 80 percent of Zimbabweans depend almost entirely on rain to feed their crops and livestock. Below-average rainfall is in the forecast again for January-March 2020, the main growing season ahead of the April harvest. With the 2019 corn harvest down by over 50 percent in 2018, it’s less than half the national requirement.

Photo: WFP/Sophia Robele
Square photograph of Withered Crops Detailed photograph of Withered Crops
Photo: WFP/Sophia Robele

Withered Crops

Charles Muzamba, a beneficiary of WFP’s Lean Season Assistance program, stands in front of his empty field that should have crops at least a meter high by this time in the season.

Detailed photograph of Dry Dams
Photo: WFP/Sophia Robele

Dry Dams

This dam was built through WFP’s Productive Asset Creation program and had served as a key source of water for the community. It's water is now too low to reach the catchment.

Detailed photograph of Struggling Farmers
Photo: WFP/Sophia Robele

Struggling Farmers

More than two-thirds of Zimbabweans are subsistence farmers who rely on a single, increasingly unreliable rainy season to grow corn. WFP is actively promoting a transition to more nutritious, indigenous and drought-resistant crops like sorghum and millet.

These Are Their Stories

Photo: WFP/David Orr WFP Expands Emergency Operation in Zimbabwe as Drought and Economic Hardship Plunge Millions Into Hunger

Zimbabwe’s hunger crisis - the worst in more than a decade - is part of an unprecedented climate-driven disaster gripping southern Africa. WFP plans to more than double the number of people it is helping by January to 4.1 million.

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Photo: WFP/Simon Pierre Diouf As Climate Shocks Intensify, UN Food Agencies Urge More Support for Southern Africa’s Hungry People

Persistent drought, back-to-back cyclones and flooding have wreaked havoc on harvests in a region overly dependent on rain-fed, small-scale agriculture.

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Photo: WFP/Gabriela Vivacqua Climate Change & Hunger: Stories From 6 African Countries

Extreme weather events are rapidly increasing hunger and malnourishment. From hurricanes and flooding to droughts and desertification, these six stories portray the very real, very human impacts of a warming world.

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It’s estimated that nearly 5.5 million people, including 2.6 million children – a third of Zimbabwe’s population – will need food assistance by 2020.

WFP has plans to deliver 265,000 tons of food by mid-2020
But less than 30% of funding requirements have been met
we need your support to continue this lifesaving work
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