Africa-Press – Angola. More than 20 million people in the Southern region of Africa face severe hunger, as a result of an unprecedented drought induced by the El Niño phenomenon, said, Wednesday, Angola’s permanent representative to the United Nations, Francisco José da Cruz.
The diplomat, who was speaking during the monthly coordination meeting of the SADC Group of countries, named Angola, Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia and Zimbabwe as the most affected countries in the region.
He said that the current impact of El Niño, which became one of the strongest in history in the last quarter of 2023, reached its peak in the first quarter of 2024, but its impacts in Southern Africa are expected to persist until April 2025.
On the occasion, he reported on the recent extraordinary Summit of Heads of State and Government of the Southern African Development Community (SADC), which culminated in a regional humanitarian appeal from the community, budgeted at at least 5.5 billion US dollars.
“This amount is intended to increase the domestic resources of affected member states, including the resource mobilization efforts of national, regional and international partners in response to the impacts of El Nino-induced drought and flooding.” , he stressed.
The Extraordinary Summit of SADC Heads of State and Government that addressed the drought in the SADC region, was chaired by the President of the Republic, João Lourenço.
Francisco José da Cruz announced that the Summit had received a report on the impact of disasters in the region and expressed concern about the humanitarian situation caused by the drought and floods induced by the El Niño phenomenon, which affected more than 61 million people.
He noted that the meeting recognized the pledge of US$33 million from OCHA, and US$10 million from FAO to the SADC regional humanitarian appeal and called for additional support from the international community to meet urgent humanitarian needs in affected Member States and communities..
During the meeting, the permanent representatives of SADC countries were informed about the candidacy of Eunice Njovana, from Zimbabwe to the Committee for the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) for the period 2025-2028.
The moment also served to share information about the preparations for the Future Summit, the global digital pact, the world social summit and the political declaration, referring to the High Level meeting on Antimicrobial Resistance.
SADC includes Angola, Botswana, Comoros, Democratic Republic of Congo, eSwatini, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
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