New Delhi, Sep 8 (IANS): India has sent humanitarian aid to Zimbabwe in the form of a consignment of 1000 metric tonnes of rice to help fulfill the food security needs of the people in the drought-affected African country, the Ministry of External Affairs Spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said in a statement.
In a post on Saturday evening on X, Jaiswal said, "India sends humanitarian aid to Zimbabwe. A consignment of 1000MT rice departed from the Nhava Sheva port for Zimbabwe today. This would help meeting food security needs of the Zimbabwean people."
A new report from the UN aid coordination office (OCHA) on August 7 reveals that food insecurity levels in Zimbabwe are rapidly deteriorating after it was hit with historic droughts due to the El Nino weather pattern.
This comes just two months after UN humanitarians declared Zimbabwe as one of the hunger hotspots where acute food insecurity was likely to deteriorate.
Droughts and storms have destroyed more than half of the country's harvest, leaving about 7.6 million people at risk of acute hunger.
El Nino is a regular and naturally occurring weather event which affects the air temperatures around the sea and coastal landmasses. The climate crisis in recent years has led to more frequent and intense patterns.
Officials from the UN and the World Food Programme (WFP) recently visited Zimbabwe to determine the drought's impact on the nation and to call for more international support for the humanitarian response.
In April, local Zimbabwean authorities declared that the country was in a nationwide state of disaster.
Figures from the authorities showed that 57 per cent of people in "rural" parts of the country are set to be food insecure between January and March 2025 – a peak hunger period there.
Other UN reports indicate that civilians will need to depend on "alternative sources of income, social support, and humanitarian assistance" to withstand this season.
It was further reported that "humanitarian assistance needs will remain high in many areas of the country until the harvest in 2025 due to poor purchasing capacity resulting from limited income-earning opportunities and high food prices".
The El Nino-induced droughts have reportedly put a strain on Zimbabwe's economy, leaving more than a fifth of children out of school and a lack of water supplies in the country.
The UN and some of its partners are working with the Zimbabwean government to provide aid to civilians.
However, these teams require more funding, as the $429 million flash appeal which was launched in May that aims to aid more than three million people, is only about 11 per cent funded.
The El Nino droughts have also affected other South African countries, including Congo, Madagascar, Malawi, etc. Each of these nations is in high need of humanitarian interventions as food insecurity levels have risen significantly due to the drought.