IGAD member states strongly urged to increase resource allocation
All eight Member States of the Intergovernmental Development Agency are called upon to increase the allocation of resources to disaster risk management.
The IGAD 12th Steering Committee and 7th General Assembly, held in Mombasa, were also asked to step up cooperation efforts that will protect people vulnerable to disasters such as droughts, floods, among other locusts.
Patrick Wilson, USAID’s Deputy Director of Kenya and East Africa, who also represented the Global Alliance, said this would also reduce the need for humanitarian aid. “Member States must devote sufficient resources to tackling these disasters to be prepared, not for it, for when they occur,” said Wilson, who approached the meeting almost from Nairobi.
IGAD Session President and Devolution CS Eugene Wamalwa said that although significant progress has been made especially by the host nation, more needs to be done.
He stressed the need for more co-operation efforts from Member States to fully achieve sustainability in disaster management. “Droughts and related environmental challenges do not respect political boundaries,” he said.
His sentiments were echoed by IGAD executive secretary Workneh Gebeyehu, who said 70 percent of the land area in the IGAD region is categorized as arid and semi-arid lands. “This is why our climate forecasts show that the IGAD region is at the forefront of climate change and will heat up on average twice as fast as the rest of the world,” Gebeyehu said.
This, he said, risks escalating conflicts as a result of competition for the ever-declining resources. “If we also consider the simultaneous occurrence of related disasters, such as seasonal flooding, chronic invasion of the desert jumps and most recently the Covid-19 pandemic, the situation in our region will become more uncertain,” he said.
Gebeyehu said the latest data from the IGAD-led Working Group on Food Safety and Nutrition estimates that 31 million people in IGAD member countries face severe food insecurity and need urgent help. “Of particular concern are 105,000 of our brothers and sisters in South Sudan whose food security status is categorized as catastrophic,” he said.
“A closer look at this crisis shows that the effects of climate change, natural disasters and economic shocks will require more of our people’s lives than conflict alone,” Gebeyehu said.
Wamalwa said Kenya set up the National Drought Contingency Fund following the IGAD General Assembly in Nairobi in 2019 and this will go a long way to alleviating the effects of drought in the country.
Kenya is in the process of operationalizing the fund, with the current rules already in place.
NDEF is a multi-donor fund for drought preparedness, resilience and quick response.
Wilson praised Kenya for the fund.
Devolution CS said Kenya has also already come up with a disaster management policy that will set up another fund to respond to other disasters.
Kenya, he said, has also embarked on a process in which more resources will be allocated to grassroots.
Through BBI, the government intends to increase the allocation to counties from the current 15 percent of the revenue collected in the last fiscal year to 35 percent.
“This is against building resilience,” he said.
Wamalwa said the NDEF already has around Sh2 billion.
The two called on IGAD member countries, including Uganda, Kenya, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia, South Sudan and Sudan, to step up their cooperation efforts to achieve drought resistance.
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