Absence of drought management concern to Africa

The absence of drought management policies and early warning systems in African countries area major concern, Namibia's international affairs minister said Monday.

Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah told the first ever African Drought Conference that opened in Windhoek that in order to circumvent this problem, Africa needs to develop coping drought mechanism if Agenda 2063 is to be realized.

"We have to overcome the prevailing paradigm of reactive and crisis-based approaches to drought that are indispensable to reduce the risks and mitigating the impacts of drought, floods and other disasters," she said.

The conference that ends Friday comes as a result of decisions taken by the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification, the African Union, the African Ministerial Conference on the Environment and the United Nations Environmental Assembly.

It is being attended by more than 600 delegates from Africa.

The theme of the conference is Towards a Strategic Framework for Enhancing Resilience to Drought at the African Level that will Contribute to Poverty Alleviation, Economic Development and Enhance Environmental and Human Well Being.

Nandi-Ndaitwah further said most African countries were unable to meet the commitment made in Maputo in 2003 that governments should at least allocate 10 percent of their national budgets to agriculture.

"The Maputo commitment was reaffirmed by the Malabo Declaration that called for the ending of hunger and halving poverty through inclusive agricultural growth by 2015," he said.

By 2015, she added, only 11 African countries managed to allocate 10 percent or more to agriculture, something that hows that drought intervention is a challenge.

Namibia's environment minister Pohamba Shifeta, whose ministry is organizing the event also said during the opening that conference is part of the commitments made during the 11th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification in 2013.

"It is indeed a fitting time to host this conference now as we face into another year of severe drought across the continent," he said, adding that they cannot miss the political momentum behind tackling desertification, drought and land degradation.

Source : XINHUA