Press release

Medair Responding to Drought in Southern Madagascar

3 June 2021  /  Madagascar

Mialy Chrystelle Rakotomavo

Communications Officer

Lausanne, 19 May 2021 – Emergency relief and recovery organisation Medair is responding to the extreme drought in Southern Madagascar, where years without rain has left more than one million people severely food insecure.

‘The situation in the south of Madagascar is as serious as they come,’ says Evelyn Speich-Baer, Country Director for Madagascar. ‘We’ve met people who are eating locusts, wild bulbs, and tamarind mixed with clay just to survive. It is already catastrophic and will only get worse without immediate intervention.’

According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, more than two in five people in Madagascar’s Grand Sud region face severe food shortages. It is the worst drought the island nation has experienced in 40 years and is being exacerbated by violent windstorms that are removing topsoil needed for agriculture. The drought is having a knock-on impact for security, with cattle-rustling activities limiting access to essential services, such as health clinics.

Medair has already begun delivering safe drinking water and essential hygiene items such as soap and buckets to drought-affected communities in Grand Sud. These activities will provide immediate relief and help prevent the spread of waterborne illnesses, which can contribute to the development of malnutrition in young children.

‘Humanitarian organisations like ours urgently need support to address this already desperate situation,’ says Speich-Baer. ‘People’s lives and livelihoods are at stake. We cannot delay our response, not for one second.’

Madagascar is particularly vulnerable to extreme weather and the changing climate. It remains an under-reported emergency.

Medair has been working in Madagascar since 2002, providing safe water and hygiene support to families living in remote locations, and establishing early storm-warning systems to alert communities of tropical storms that can cause flash floods strong enough to destroy homes and livelihoods.

Medair works in some of the most remote and challenging humanitarian contexts in the world, providing urgently needed health services, safe water and hygiene interventions, and shelter and infrastructure solutions to communities affected by crisis. Medair currently works in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Jordan, Lebanon, Madagascar, Somalia, Sudan, South Sudan, Syria, and Yemen.

For interviews and photographs, please contact:

Mialy Chrystelle Rakotomavo
Communications Officer (Malagasy, French, English):
+261 32 05 146 02
chrystelle.rakotomavo@medair.org

Jonathan Kyle
Communications Manager (French, English)
jonathan.kyle@medair.org

For regular updates, please visit www.medair.org or follow us on Twitter: @Medairint.

This content was produced with resources gathered by Medair field and headquarters staff. The views expressed herein are those solely of Medair and should not be taken, in any way, to reflect the official opinion of any other organisation.