Highlights
The population in Madagascar’s arid South continues to face extreme humanitarian needs due to the long lasting consequences of the drought exacerbated by El Nino. Data from malnutrition screening in June bring the total number of children under 5 in the 8 most affected districts in the South suffering from acute malnutrition (GAM) to 57,000, among them, 10,000 are suffering from severe acute malnutrition (SAM). Water scarcity in many districts across the affected regions remains a major obstacle to the resilience of families in most aspects of their lives.
UNICEF and partners carried out the fourth periodic malnutrition screenings of 300,000 children under 59 months in June 2016, bringing the total number of SAM children treated with support from UNICEF to nearly 16,500 since 2015 (including 8,000 in 2016). Over 139,120 people since 2015 have also gained access to safe water through UNICEF’s ongoing support to the construction of 104 boreholes, 186m3 of trucked water and rehabilitation of 55 water points.
The Assistant Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs, Ms. Kyung Wha Kang, visited the affected areas with operating UN Agencies and highlighted the severity of the crisis caused by the extreme vulnerability and poverty of the population, as well as the need to break the crisis cycle through long lasting interventions and the moral obligation for donors to put Madagascar (so far quasi forgotten) high on their priority list.
While the drought in the south remains the most urgent humanitarian situation, the country and international community is prepared for the La Nina induced phenomenon which is expected to impact a large portion of the country in the coming months