The drought situation in Meru County is still dire, with about 35 per cent of the estimated 1.5 million population waiting upon the government and other partners to provide relief food as a mitigation measure, County Commissioner Fred Ndunga has revealed.
Chairing a county steering group meeting, County Commissioner, Fred Ndunga said out of the 12 sub-counties, nine had benefitted from a recent relief food consignment received from the national government, with those in Tigania and Igembe region receiving a maximum of 200 50kg bags of rice, along with 360 50kg bags of beans for distributed as per the vulnerability assessment of beneficiaries.
Commending several partners who had come out to support the government in distributing relief food to the affected households, Ndunga appealed to more organizations and individuals to get on board and ensure nobody succumbs to hunger in the larger Meru County.
Ndunga noted although some sub-counties had not benefited from relief food consignments received in the county so far, the fact remained that all sub-counties had genuine food-poor pockets in need of interventions.
He asked Deputy County Commissioners to liaise with the education department to identify the neediest learning institutions in their areas, to enable them to support school feeding programs in order to retain learners as well as ensure national examination candidates were not disrupted by the prevailing lack of food at the household level.
The administrator disclosed that plans were underway to have relief food allocated to Imenti North, Central and South sub-counties, especially to schools bordering Tharaka South Sub-County in Tharaka Nithi County.
“We are aware that some of our learning institutions have learners from our neighbouring counties, where drought is slightly more severe than ours,” Ndunga said.
Ndunga asked the DCC to be more proactive in liaising with potential partners in the fight against hunger in their areas of jurisdiction, to have them chip in and support ongoing government intervention measures to save human and livestock life.
By Makaa Margaret
