More than a million people are fleeing tensions with armed groups. And displacement only worsens food insecurity. No land, no crops, no food
Out of a population of just over 21 million people, 3.5 million people in Burkina Faso are in need of humanitarian aid, of which about 2 million are in a state of food emergency. Hunger is chronic in this land of western Africa. The presence and activities of religious armed groups have a very strong impact on many regions.
The increase in violence, displacement and the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in a 65.7% increase in people living in food insecurity between 2019 and 2020: adding to the scarcity of agricultural land in the areas of the host communities is the abandonment of crops and stocks of food due to continuous displacement. Health needs are high, access to services is scarce and insecurity has led to the suspension of services in various health centers.
Intersos’ intervention against malnutrition
As reported by the World Food Program and FAO’s Call for Action to Avert Famine, since the beginning of 2021, 270 million people suffer from severe food insecurity or are at high risk. Burkina Faso is one of the countries most affected by the phenomenon. While the humanitarian situation continues to deteriorate and the number of internally displaced people has reached 1.4 million in July 2021, Intersos does not stop its intervention in support of people in need, starting with the activities of food security, through the distribution of basic necessities. Among these, of vital importance is the nutritional supplement for minors between 6-23 months, those who are most at risk of losing their lives due to malnutrition.
“Security is undoubtedly constantly uncertain – Miroslav Skoumal, head of the Intersos Burkina Faso mission says – the continuous hostilities between the armed groups and the government forces make this a changing territory”. All this causes mass displacements of people, especially in the East where: “We intervened by distributing essential goods to 5,500 people in the first two weeks of August alone, and in the previous period we came to assist almost 20 thousand” the head of mission continues.
Intersos in Burkina Faso
Intersos started working in the country in 2019 and currently operates in the Northern, Eastern, Boucle du Mouhoun and Central Plateau regions. Together with the activities of protection of vulnerable people, through the monitoring of vulnerabilities and psychosocial support to survivors of violence, our projects aim to reduce food insecurity and malnutrition. In Burkina Faso, as in many other countries, we take care of treating acute malnutrition of women and children through nutritional therapies, which restore a proper diet, integrated with antibiotics. According to data collected from January to July 202, 1,518 cases of acute malnutrition were treated, while the number of malnourished pregnant and lactating women we have followed with nutritional therapies is 304 along with 1,214 children from 0 to 59 months.