London ? Further scientific improvements to famine forecasting will do little to save more lives without reforms to the way in which the humanitarian community uses them, according to a report published today (5 April).
Despite being preventable because of sophisticated early warning systems, famine crises continue to be deadly. This is because warnings are systematically ignored by donor governments, agencies and governments in affected countries, says the report, published by Chatham House, an independent think-tank based in London, United Kingdom.
SPEED READ
Famine forecasting systems have improved dramatically over the last 30 years, says a report
But governments and agencies continue to ignore their warnings
Political hurdles must be tackled if progress is to be made
"The question we are asking in the report is why early warning systems - which have dramatically improved over the last 20-30 years - are good at predicting crises but bad at triggering preventive action," says the author, Rob Bailey, a senior research fellow at the Royal Institute of International Affairs, which is based at Chatham House.
The report, 'Managing Famine Risk: Linking Early Warning to Early Action', draws on experiences from recent famines in the Horn and Sahel regions of Africa, where little action was taken regardless of warnings being issued months ahead, as SciDev.Net revealed in 2011.
A food crisis is a "slow-onset disaster", it says, that allows plenty of time to anticipate the problem and take precautionary action.
But while the warning side of this equation works well, the precautionary actions side commonly fails for a variety of reasons, and the report offers recommendations to help bridge the gap between early warnings and responses.
While governments in affected countries should focus on building capacity and reducing vulnerability among at-risk groups, humanitarian agencies need to improve their preparedness by taking initiatives such as arranging for emergency supplies, it says.
Source: http://allafrica.com/stories/201304051646.html
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