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Parts of PNG facing food shortage

Pays
Papouasie-Nouvelle-Guinée
Sources
PINA
Date de publication
Origine
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Certain parts of Papua New Guinea are still facing food shortage months after the drought hit the country, according to Dr Mike Bourke of the Australian National University.

He told The National that this was particularly true in parts of Western and Milne Bay.

“The drought is well and truly over. All over Papua New Guinea, it’s been raining,” Bourke said. He is a technical adviser for the church partnership programme.

He said people in parts of Western, especially in the Nomad Local Level Government, still faced food shortage.

“This has been going on for almost a year now, and also down in Morehead.

“Food is also short in Milne Bay, particularly in many small atolls and small islands, and also in the north coast towards Rabaraba.”

He said the high-altitude areas badly hit last July by frost included Kandep and Upper Lagaip Valley in Enga, and across the provincial border into Hela.

“Food is still scarce. Food distribution is going on as we speak.”

Bourke said international organisations such as the World Food Programme and CARE were involved in food distribution.

“Even now in 2016, the impact of food shortage is still happening,” he said.

“A limited number of areas, but we are talking about 250,000 to 300,000 people.

“There are about 80,000 people in Milne Bay and there are maybe 40,000 people in Western. The numbers are reasonably large.”

Dr Bourke said things would get better soon.

“Our understanding is that by September, this will be all over. But that’s three months away and still a long time to be short of food,” he said.

Meanwhile, Dr Bourke says data on the recent El Nino-induced drought must be recorded and kept for future reference.

Dr Bourke said this because the country was likely to face more similar weather patterns caused by climate change.

“Specialists tell us that we’re probably going to have more El Ninos in the future,” he said.

“They tell us that Papua New Guinea in general is going to get wetter and other places are going to get drier.

“Overall, Papua New Guinea will probably get wetter with climate change, and we’ll probably get more El Ninos.

“What I’m saying is that it (El Nino) is going to come back. That’s why I’ve talked before about the need to record our experience in 2015 and 2016, just like we did in 1997 and 1998.”

Dr Bourke, who was involved in the 1997-1998 El Nino rehabilitation, said the drought then was bigger than the recent one.

“What we had at an international level or PNG level was even bigger than this,” he said.

“If you’re sitting on an island in Milne Bay, or sitting in Morehead or Mougolu (in Western), you don’t care whether these comparisons are relevant. What is relevant is your food.

“When I look at the national level, I can say that this is not quite as bad as 1997.”

Dr Bourke said history showed that there had been El Ninos in 1903, 1914, 1941, 1972, 1982, 1997 and 2015.

“We don’t know whether these are going to get worse in future with climate change,” he said.

“We know that climate is changing. Anybody who lives in a small atoll in Milne Bay, Bougainville or Manus knows that the sea level is rising.”

SOURCE: THE NATIONAL/PACNEWS