20090929 AFRICA: The Drought Revisited

clipped from www.time.com Despite moderate rains last year, four of Ethiopia's 14 provinces have massive hunger problems. The worst-hit areas are Eritrea where the civil war has driven farmers from parched fields The heavy rains which are due in Somalia later this year will be crucial to the survival of thousands of people. But semi-arid Somalia cannot indefinitely support 4 million nomads in a total population of 5 million. The leftist military government is trying to force hundreds of thousands of nomads to settle as farmers on land that can be irrigated, or to become fishermen along the nation's 1,800-mile coastline. The proud nomads are contemptuous of both farmers and fishermen. But with their herds decimated and the continuing threat of starvation, they will probably give in. As an East bloc diplomat in the Somali capital of Mogadishu puts it: "The choice, for many, is to switch or starve."