Food Relief Efforts

Your generosity can save lives. Act now to feed the hungry.

The signs of the drought are everywhere.

Grain bins that usually overflow sit empty. Dust swirls over dry, barren fields. Starving cattle stagger on weak legs as they search for water. Worried parents wonder how they will feed their children. Some students spend all day at school with nothing to eat.  Other students drop out because there is no money to pay school fees.

This is the situation in Zambia’s Southern Province. The rainy season begins in November and ends in April. During these months, fields are plowed, seed is sown, the rains come, and the maize grows. Most families depend on the maize crops for daily food and as a source of cash for other necessities. 

But in the 2018-2019 season the rains did not come. Southern Zambia recorded the lowest seasonal rainfall since 1981. This year there is little or nothing to eat and nothing to sell for cash. Villagers in drought-stricken communities are surviving on roots and wild tree fruits. In communities without water wells, villagers must go farther and farther to find water as streams and rivers dry up. Thousands of lives are adversely affected by the lack of food and clean water. 

Namwianga is providing food relief to the hungry. Truckloads of maize have been delivered to areas where the need is greatest. The food relief efforts will continue until the drought is over.

The severity of this drought means that relief efforts will be long-term and costly. You can prevent starvation and ease the suffering of hungry and desperate Zambians by donating generously.

Read more about the current situation and about water wells.