Halima Hussein is a nurse in a therapeutic feeding center in Mogadishu. Photo by Caroline Gluck

Oxfam’s Caroline Gluck spoke recently with Halima Hussein, a 42-year-old nurse working for SAACID, one of Oxfam’s local partners in Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu. She’s based at the emergency therapeutic center in Badbaado, the city’s largest camp for people displaced by the conflict and drought ravaging the country. Here, in an interview recorded by Gluck, Hussein talks about the challenges of the job and what keeps her going.

“I work with mothers and with children. Every day we see on average 200 to 250 people.   They are in different situations. Some are severely malnourished, some are moderately malnourished; others have complications.

 “People come to us initially for an assessment, and if we can treat them we do this in the center. If there are complications, we might have to refer them to a hospital.

“I’m a mother myself. I have five children. The oldest is 21. The others are 18, 14, 5, and 4.  I think about my family a lot in terms of this work.  I always think if this is my child, if they are like this, what could I do for them?  Sometimes I cry when I see the mothers like me suffering and others less fortunate than me…

“We face many problems.  The biggest one I have is how to convince a mother that it’s best to refer her child to the hospital when the child is suffering so much.  They often tell us:  ‘I have four to five other children at home.  Who’ll take care of them?’  Instead of spending four to five days with one child, they think of the other children…

“Three or four children are dying every week in Badbaado. These are children that I see or know about but I think the actual cases are far higher.  Read the rest of this entry »

Oxfam's partner, Hijra, has been providing safe drinking water to more than 100,000 people in camps in Somalia.

Oxfam’s Caroline Gluck was recently part of the organization’s first visit to Somalia by non-African staffers in several years. Here is the second part of her account of a trip shaped by strict security rules. 

My glimpses of Mogadishu, behind the tinted windows of our car speeding as fast as it could to avoid being a sitting target, were tantalisingly brief.   The legacy of war was obvious: there were many wrecked or bullet-marked buildings.

But the city also showed surprising signs of brisk daily life. There were colorful hand-painted shop signs advertising wares; traders sat on the dusty roadside touting their goods—often small collections of fruit and vegetables. Some sat behind sandbags, which might offer protection if fighting flared.   Though signs of commerce and of food availability were evident, for many who fled hunger and drought, the prices were way above what they could afford.

That’s why the centers that offered some basic help were packed.   At one community-based therapeutic care center I visited run by SAACID, staffers were working flat-out as mothers and their children continued to stream in. Read the rest of this entry »

Yesterday the UN announced that famine conditions have spread to six regions of Somalia and are affecting 750,000 people, many of them children. One of Oxfam’s local partners, Wajir South Development Association (WASDA), works with drought-hit communities in Wajir in northeastern Kenya, as well as in Lower and Middle Juba in Somalia itself. WASDA program manager Bashir Mohamed, who regularly travels into Somalia, spoke to Oxfam’s Caroline Gluck about conditions on the ground right now and the process of getting aid to those who need it most.

“… Some areas of Somalia, like Mogadishu and Gedo, have been getting more aid.  Apart from the border town of Dobley [which lies en route to Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya], nothing much has reached people in Lower and Middle Juba. Access is a big problem; it’s taken a long time to get agreement from authorities for programs to start and we’ve had many delays.

Bashir Mohamed. Photo: Oxfam

“But now I hope we will be moving fast in our work. We’ve now got agreement for our cash distribution program to start. We will be targeting 14,600 households in middle Juba and lower Juba and hope we might be able to start this week. 

“We have been trucking in water into Lower Juba since July.  But the numbers of people [who need] water are increasing as the situation is getting worse. And we’ve been providing fuel subsidies to some communities so that boreholes can run 24 hours a day, as well as rehabilitating shallow wells.

“We’re planning to drill four new boreholes in the next few weeks in Lower Juba (in Hagar; Nasiriya, Wel Marow, and Bibi). And the drilling could take several weeks. The sites have all [been] chosen for their strategic locations. These are pastoral areas, but very far from rivers, towns, or other water points … so when they’re finished, it will be a great help to many people.

“Conditions are very severe; there are no health facilities and people face restrictions on their movements. People are just praying for the coming rains. But even if the rains come and we manage to reach everyone targeted in our interventions, this emergency will continue will into January and February at the earliest.

Read the rest of this entry »

"We left our village because of the drought," said Fatima Mohammed, a mother of four from Somalia whose family sought shelter in Ethiopia. Photo: Jane Beesley / Oxfam America

Somalia remains the epicenter of the drought and food crisis in East Africa, with 3.7 million men, women, and children affected. Famine has been declared in some parts of the country, and the UN estimates about a quarter of Somalia’s population—1.8 million people—has been displaced. 

Since early August, Oxfam has provided clean water and sanitation for an estimated 11,000 Somali refugees in Hilaweyn camp, in Dollo Ado, Ethiopia. Oxfam’s Jane Beesley visited Dollo Ado last month and spoke with recently arrived refugees, whose stories are excerpted below.

Hussain Aden said his family walked for 30 days to reach a refugee camp in Ethiopia. Photo: Jane Beesley/Oxfam

Hussain Aden, left, and his family walked for 30 days to reach Dollo Ado from their village, Juwari. “We have a household of 20 people, including children and grandchildren,” he said. “We left due to hunger and drought. We used to have livestock. They all died: 35 cattle and 15 sheep. When the last one died that is when we decided to leave. We left our houses and came here. Before there were droughts but not like this. I don’t know when the drought will end.

“On the way we were very dusty and hungry. We had a little maize that we prepared on the way. We walked with our children on our backs … the children are small and couldn’t walk by themselves.”

Aden said one of the challenges the family faces now is the lack of opportunities to earn a decent income. “All the men want to work, but there is nothing for us. The women are collecting firewood, which they sell … [but] we are idle when we want to work.”

Hawa Aden said she collects and sells firewood to buy food for her family. Photo: Jane Beesley/Oxfam

 “I went out and collected firewood early this morning,” said his wife, Hawa Aden. “Normally we go at 7am and come back at 1pm. I go with a lot of other women. It takes three hours to get to the place where we collect wood.

“If I sell wood in the camp I get 5 Birr (about 29 cents), but if I go into town I can get 10 Birr (58 cents). It takes me one hour to walk into town and another hour to walk back. I use the money to buy tea, salt … food for the family. I get water in the camp, one jerry can a day. I use the water for bathing the children, preparing tea, and drinking. … I have two children, both boys; they are 7 and 4.”

Fatima Mohammed, pictured above, arrived in Dollo Ado with her four children. Her family was waiting in a transitional camp before moving to long-term shelter.  “We left our village because of the drought,” she said. “We’ve been experiencing drought now for three years. All the people from my village have come here. We’d heard people were coming to Dollo Ado. On the way we asked people for directions.

“I think life here compared to there will be different for us,” said Mohammed. “When I arrived I felt satisfied, because I thought now I’ll get everything I need—enough food, enough water, and my children will get good medicine.”

Oxfam aims to reach more than 3 million people throughout East Africa with a variety of support, including food aid, clean water, and veterinary care for animals. We are drilling and repairing wells and distributing fuel vouchers to ensure that pumps on the wells can keep operating—even if people have no money. We are also campaigning to change the root causes of this crisis. Find out how you can support our efforts.

Just in time for World Humanitarian Day, we received this short video profiling a day in the life of Oxfam plumber Silas Kipsang. True, fixing water leaks, maintaining pipes, and digging wells may not be the most glamorous aspects of humanitarian aid work. But for thousands of people seeking shelter in Kenya’s Dadaab refugee camp, the efforts of people like Kipsang are what keep the clean water flowing. And that’s an accomplishment to celebrate, no matter what day it is.

Oxfam aims to reach 3 million people with a variety of support, including food aid, clean water, and veterinary care for animals. We are drilling and repairing wells and distributing fuel vouchers to ensure that pumps on the wells can keep operating—even if people have no money. We are also campaigning to change the root causes of this crisis. Find out how you can support our efforts.

Kenny Rae/Oxfam America

This just came to us from Kenny Rae, a public health engineer currently working in southern Ethiopia helping to rehabilitate water systems.

“As with other pastoralist families in Dire district in Southern Ethiopia, 10-year-old Guyo Hamadi and his family are traveling with their herd of cattle in an increasingly more difficult search for water and fodder. Guyo and his father and brother will travel more than 20 kilometers (about 12 miles) to provide water for their herd, of which they have already lost one third due to the drought. Oxfam’s drought response program in Dire includes rehabilitating wells that will provide water for people and their livestock, and the delivery of water by tanker truck to meet immediate needs in outlying areas.”

Oxfam aims to reach 3 million people in the East Africa region with a variety of support including food aid, clean water, and veterinary care for animals.  We are also campaigning to change the root causes of this crisis. Find out how you can support our efforts.

Abdullah Ahmed Ali, 59, helps construct latrines. Photo by Oxfam.

Guest blog: Janna Hamilton, Media Coordinator for Oxfam, is reporting from the Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya. Oxfam is hiring camp residents to help build latrines and other work, which is helping provide services to more refugees and enabling workers earn a little money.

Abdullah Ahmed Ali, 59, has worked with Oxfam for four days, helping to construct latrines in the Ifo extension camp, part of the rapidly expanding Dadaab camp in eastern Kenya. More than 200 families are relocating to Ifo extension each day. Oxfam is scaling up its operations in order to meet the increasing demands for access to safe water and sanitation to prevent the spread of disease.

Cash-for-work initiatives offer the refugee community an opportunity to earn an income. It also helps reinforce some dignity for the workers, knowing they are helping to provide for their family. Men and women are paid between 250 and 500 Kenyan shillings (about $2.70 to $5.40) per day depending on their skill levels. Jobs for men include constructing latrines, reporting on dead livestock so they can be removed before spreading disease, and clearing new land for relocated families. Oxfam has employed women to help collect and dispose of the piles of packaging discarded from newly erected tents and materials.

Abdullah says the money he earns from Oxfam helps him to buy more food for his family of nine.

“In the camp we don’t get any sugar or vegetables, so the income I gain will be spent on buying more variety of food for my family.

“Without this job I would just be wandering around looking for any work.”

Guest blog: Janna Hamilton, Media Coordinator for Oxfam, is reporting from the Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya. There are an estimated 1,500 people moving in to the camp every day, and the camp is expanding to accommodate them.

Suban Ibrahim Kusow and her family moved from the outskirts of the refugee camp five nights earlier, where they had lived in a makeshift tent for two months since making the journey across the border from Somalia. Suban’s family is one of 200 that are relocating each day to a newly-cleared area of Ifo camp, known as the Ifo extension.

Oxfam is supplying clean, safe water and sanitation for people located in the outskirts as well as Ifo extension; building communal toilets, drilling wells and installing tanks, pipes, and tap stands

“I’m so happy to have water for drinking and washing, it makes everything clean and my children’s health will be OK when they drink it.”

“[In Somalia] we had no clean water, there were a lot of problems without it.”

“When my children drank the dirty water they had very bad diarrhea and vomiting, but now that we’re here they’re much better.”

Tede Lokapelo holds a day's worth of food. Photo by Rankin

A severe food crisis and drought is now affecting millions of people in East Africa. Among the areas hit hardest is northern Kenya’s Turkana region, where many people are herders who depend on their animals—camels, cows, goats, and sheep—for both food and income.

In March 2011, the photographer Rankin visited Turkana to capture photos and stories of people affected by the ongoing crisis. In the excerpt below, Tede Lokapelo, 85, talks about the dramatic changes he has witnessed in his lifetime.

“We are poor because the season is always dry. Everything dies, every day, every day, every day. For me the world has changed for the worse. We are living with a lot of uncertainties—no water, no food.

“It used to rain even when the grass was still green. It was never dry like this. Now maybe it rains for a few minutes or a few hours, but the earth is too dry nothing can be absorbed. This kind of drizzly rain is useless. If you look at the ground it is not even wet. You can tell whether the rain will be good or bad by looking at those mountains. You see that kind of smoke or fog? That is a symbol of the dry season. That fog needs to clear before the big rain clouds can come, then the skies can open and it will rain like it used to for days. It used to rain so that floods and rivers appear. But that will not happen until that fog disappears.

“In this community there are people called rain makers. In the past, when we had a prolonged drought, all the men would go and see the rain maker. We would sit under a special tree in the mountains and pray for rain. But God seems to have become too far away, and these traditions don’t work anymore.

“Back then we had everything, even wild animals were everywhere. There were antelopes, ostriches, wild cats, even lions, elephants, buffalo, leopards, everything. The last time I saw a lion it was 1971. By 1971 we could not see any animals here. The antelope remained around for a while but by 1988 the antelopes also started dying. The wild animals found no grass here, just dust. There was no shade for them. They began slowly dying of hunger. Those that could walk began walking away. They went to places where they could find shade and water.

“I miss those animals very much. The environment is not complete without them.

“ [Today] I only have seven goats left. I used to have 200. … This drought has taught me a lesson. I have learned that it is too difficult to keep animals. Our strong dependence on livestock, our old way of life, has completely gone.”

Oxfam aims to reach 3 million people–1.3 million in Kenya, 700,000 in Ethiopia, and 500,000 in Somalia—with a variety of support, including food aid, clean water, and veterinary care for animals. We are drilling and repairing wells and distributing fuel vouchers to ensure that pumps on the wells can keep operating—even if people have no money. Find out how you can support our efforts.

Kristin Davis meets Madina Farah Yusuf at Dadaab in Kenya.

As conflict and drought continue to ravage Somalia, the world’s largest refugee camp keeps growing—by more than 1,000 people a day. Dadaab, in Kenya, is teeming with 380,000 people, four times the number the camp was designed for.

And more are on their way.

East Africa—particularly the triangle between south and central Somalia, northern Kenya, and southern Ethiopia—is now in the grip of a serious drought and food crisis that is affecting more than 10 million people.

Oxfam Ambassador Kristin Davis, star of Sex and the City, just visited Dadaab to help draw the world’s attention to the drought and what countless refugee families are enduring.  One of the women she met there was Madina Farah Yusuf, who walked for 10 days with her seven children to reach the camp. On the way, Yusuf came across four other children whose parents had died of starvation. She took them in and guided them to Dadaab, where they are all now taking shelter together under a tree.

“We left Somalia in fear for our lives: There was so much hunger and war,” Yusuf told Davis, before recounting her harrowing journey to Dadaab and the hardships that continue. “Bandits robbed us of our food and clothes on the way. It gets very cold at night, and the children cry. We only have one blanket. It is also unprotected out in the open. I worry that hyenas will attack the children.”

At the camp, basics are in short supply.

“We drank some tea this morning,” Yusuf continued. “But we have very little food. The rations are not enough for everyone to eat every day.”

An Oxfam pump a few hundred feet away is providing her family with water, but many people still need shelter and toilets.

Oxfam is responding to the drought and food crisis with water, sanitation services, and food. Our goal is to reach 3 million people. Your support can help us get there.