The Gaps in this Family Portrait
Part II of the Descendent of the Hyena Story.
Photo and Text: Samuel Hauenstein Swan – www.SamBronx-Photo.com
The few months after harvest in September, are comfortable for the community of Guidan Koura. Food is readily available. The water holes are replenished and full. The time of plenty is short-lived
Zara’s husband is missing, from the picture, he is coming only for the short rainy season to help with the agricultural season and harvest. they all know there will not be sufficient work or food for all and he is leaving for the rest of the year to work in the faraway coastal countries the rest of the year.
Soon the supplies reduce, the mothers have to think of the months to come and start to ration. Orientate their thoughts to the long months ahead. Survival to Zara’s family will depend on her forward thinking and her ability to balance her household economy and care duties as a mother.
2005 was a terrible year the harvest was small, no one in the village had much grain. The social fabric of the community began to unravel; neighbours hid food from each other, knowing that dividing food into even smaller portions would mean starvation for all. Hunger drove them all mad. It was then when Zara’s big sister fell ill and died; she left two daughters to look after. With no food in the home and two more mouths to feed her second born boy fell behind. He too died during the 2005 hunger season.
Zara now calls three daughters and two boys, one born in 2007 her children.
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Clémence’s soft toy
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Clémence is holding onto her soft toy Dalmatian Puppy, her mother gave her for Christmas. Children all over the world hold on to their cuddly toys for comfort in unfamiliar places. Clémence is no different.
I meet her and her mother, Anita, in the intensive nutrition unit of the pediatric hospital in Bangui, the Central African Republic. 29,250 children under 5 years suffering from acute malnutrition are admitted for therapeutic care. The principal referral centre of the capital is crowded with children that have fallen ill with the most severe and deadly form of malnutrition. There is little noise from these children: too ill to play, too weak to express discomfort.
At two and a half years old and 5.5 kg, Clémence is barely above the weight of a new born baby. I learned how she came here as her mother, Anita, props her up in her lap. A few weeks back she was a strong and joyful little child playing in the streets near her home. All changed when she caught malaria and lost appetite fighting the fever. Weakened by illness, she developed diarrhea and quickly lost weight to the point that her parents got very worried and brought her into the hospital, where they learned their child was suffering from severe malnutrition.
Severe malnutrition is one of the greatest challenges to child survival in the world today. Affecting 16 million children worldwide and responsible for up to two million child deaths each year, it is the most lethal form of malnutrition.
Clémence is clinging onto her Dalmatian toy when the nurse tries to move it to take the temperature. Her breathing is very quick and she seems to drift in and out of sleep. She is unable to move her head up and look around. Having worked with ACF for many years, the intensive nutrition units are the hardest, saddest places to visit. No child should ever fall ill with Severe malnutrition. It is the epitome of an unjust world: a place that produces more food that it can eat and has the knowledge to treat infections these children can no longer fight.
However, nutrition units are also places of hope. Last year 87% of children brought to our nutrition clinics in CAR recovered and returned home. ACF cured more than three million children around the world last year alone. Effective community treatment, equipped with products like therapeutic foods, reach children living in the most marginalised and conflict ridden areas of the world. Where the illness is extremely severe and complicated by infection as it was with Clémence, inpatient treatment with the supervision of ACF doctors and nurses around the clock is the only option. CAR has experienced high levels of violence that have devastated its health system and increased poverty, so only few referral centres are available.
Talking to Anita, a law student, she was hopeful that the treatment was working and there were some signs that her child was getting better. Trying to feed her was not easy, as Clémence was spilling much of the therapeutic milk and having difficulties even swallowing. Feeding ill children is a painfully slow and delicate process as any parents know. Here it is an act of desperation to save a child. My presence was not helping as Clémence was distracted. I left the hospital where Anita was hopeful that her daughter would gain weight and get back her appetite so they could return home. I felt hopeful that Clémence’s mother was right.
Arriving back in the UK I had some horrible, sad news from Central African Republic. Clémence died from severe malnutrition only days after I left her bedside. Her mum was doing her best. In a country that has high rates of illness, only few health care workers are at hand to help her to detect the early signs of malnutrition and get treatment. This Mother couldn’t prevent her baby from getting regular bouts of malaria or the diarrhea that followed and weakened her little girl, and led to the severe malnutrition. She is one case in about 700 malnutrition-related deaths per year in CAR.
We do save lives in our projects every day. Sadly we failed Clémence. Despite our best effort, too many children still do not make it through severe malnutrition. In 2015 Action Against Hunger treated 1,560,000 children: more than any previous year. We have to do even more. Anita, her story and pictures serve me as a reminder to raise awareness of the unspeakable injustices of malnutrition so many children in CAR and worldwide, battle with day in day out.
Action Against Hunger are part of a massive scale up and work with communities, donors and doctors to find children long before they are severely malnourished, to expand treatment into many more health centers in order for malnourished children to stand the best chance to be cured. Referral centers such as at the Bangui paediatric hospital partner with us to deal with overwhelming numbers of malnourished children.
Dignity a necessity for Developing
World Children Day
Today it is World Children Day lets give them what they most deserve dignity!
Behind each growing up child stands a loving mother, parents and the broader community, to give them the means to succeed.
Often I hear development for good change is about boosting agricultural technology, maximising value chain beyond the farm gate, better cash or food yields, etc. While I do not doubt any of these development focuses, first of all it is about sharing dignity throughout society. This must start with the weakest in society children.
This mother in Malawi told me how she has to struggle to manage her triple tasks: working on one of the large commercial tobacco farms for cash, tending to her plot of land for food and looking after her children’s needs.
Much of the commercial farmers produce nonfood items or maize destined for expert and getting foreign currency into its economy. This mother is no exception paid poorly the cash she earns is mostly drained for expenses such as transport, housing, schooling, health, and food. What she pays for full-time agrarian about is not nearly sufficent to feed the family. She as many smallholders has to cultivate on steep hillsides and other marginal lands, often with inadequate soil and water conservation, to substitute her purchased food from the mear day labor.
When her little boy fell ill with diarrhea, she had to make the impossible desition to drop either her wage labor or neglect her plot or both to tend her child and bring him to hospital. What should be the happy end to a worrying childhood disease quick moves on to the next concern, now she has missed a day at the commercial farm; her boss might have fired her meaning she lost her income.
Investing in peoples lives not merely a functioning of economic outcomes that results in growing exports and fancier technologies, but most of all must change the balance of social justice, hegemony and leading to dignity for all. No child should grow up in a household and community that is exploited to the great good of a few pushing the dignity of many in to second place
While choices in the political world are painted in shades of grey, the consequences of those decisions are often irreversibly black and white: the joy of a healthy childhood and family or the violence of poverty and hunger. Conceiving of and the implementing mechanisms to transfer control over peoples lives from the powerful actors to the families themselves is no small goal: above the technical obstacles, voluntary giving away dominance is not something that human beings do well. Development, defined as “good change (Robert Chambers)” must strive for nothing less than a real will for justice accessible at all levels even where it is in direct conflicts with the will to power and the few that hold this power.
Rory Stewart, it is time to act to the Yemen’s looming famine
© Samuel Hauenstein Swan
By Samuel Hauenstein Swan
“I came to listen and learn from you responding to the needs of mothers, fathers and their children in Yemen,” said Rory Stewart MP, UK Minister of State for International Development. This was back in January, Now that the United Nation has announced that there is a Famine looming in Yemen will the United Kondome act on what the minister heard. Priorities what is morally the right thing to do over economic gains from selling arms that are used in this war?
Nearly three hundred delegates participated in the civil society conference on Yemen organised by Action Against Hunger with six other NGOs delivering assistance to civilians affected by the conflict. Donor officials, government representatives, UN delegates and development practitioners, followed the call by Yemeni civil society and aid agencies working in Yemen, to urgently discuss humanitarian challenges and possible options for scaling up humanitarian response.Delegate urged officials to do everything in their power to stop the vicious campaign in Yemen that has cost tens of thousands of lives and left a country in ruins. With some of the biggest powers complicit in the tragedy by supporting armies on all sides. Support that comes with huge economic gains
Nearly three hundred delegates participated in the civil society conference on Yemen organised by Action Against Hunger with six other NGOs delivering assistance to civilians affected by the conflict. Donor officials, government representatives, UN delegates and development practitioners, followed the call by Yemeni civil society and aid agencies working in Yemen, to urgently discuss humanitarian challenges and possible options for scaling up humanitarian response.
Delegate urged politicians and officials to do everything in their power to stop the vicious campaign in Yemen that has cost tens of thousands of lives and left a country in ruins. With some of the biggest powers complicit in the tragedy by supporting armies on all sides. A support that comes with huge economic gains for wealthy nations and their arms industries.
The conference participants urged stakeholders to revert current tactics and instead invest in peace. Yet, even if negotiations progress it is likely that the crisis will continue. There was an urgent call therefore for donors to increase funding and address the overwhelming needs spelt out in the Humanitarian Response Plan. The conference heard from Yemeni local NGO partners how an aerial campaign has left much of the infrastructure in rubbles and created a climate of fear whereby civilians no longer dare to seek assistance in hospitals, public buildings or schools for fear of these being targeted. Food and economic activities have collapsed, the central bank has no cash to pay public sector workers, and parents have no means to care for their children.
The systematic embargo imposed and enforced by regional and global their global allies mainly the UK and the US, in a country greatly dependent on food imports, triggered high commodity prices resulting in a profound deterioration of the nutritional situation, and hundreds of thousands of lives are at risk. An estimated 1.5 million children have fallen ill with acute malnutrition – 370,000 of whom are suffering from its most severe form. One of the leading causes of civilian deaths in Yemen’s conflict are mothers and children dying due to lack of routine health and nutrition services and lack of safe drinking water.
In the midst of violence Action Against Hunger’s team on the ground has scaled up its programmes, reaching an increasing number of children with nutrition stabilisation centres in four governorates. Our teams are running mobile clinics in the worst affected areas where health post and hospitals have stopped functioning. We are not the only international organisation to do so; nonetheless what is clear to us and other aid agencies operating in these dangerous conditions is that there is a need to increase the humanitarian capacity and diplomatic commitment on the ground.
We heard and praised the courage of the Dutch and Swedish representatives to conduct official visits to Sana’a, the principal city in North Yemen. Civil Society invites more diplomatic dialogue to explain to regional and local leaders the humanitarian principals and reach a diplomatic consensus on the engagement of aid agency and aid delivery with Yemen’s leaders.
The only UK official visiting Yemen in years is Rt Hon Andrew Mitchell MP and former Secretary of State for International Development who shared his thoughts with the participants. He summarised what he saw with the following lines: “Yemen is not starving, Yemen is being starved”. He concluded by suggesting that the UK’s inconsistent policies towards Yemen could be transformed into a force for good: “The UK can play a leading role in finding political solutions to the conflict in Yemen and to address the humanitarian crisis.”
The conference concluded with four direct calls to actions:
The international community and in particular the United Kingdom should redouble its efforts to reinvigorate the peace process, stop fueling the conflict with arms sales and press for meaningful inclusion of civil society voices at all levels to ensure any deal reached is understood and supported especially inside Yemen.
Political will must be found and implemented at all levels to ease restrictions on the flow of goods into and around the country. The cranes for Hodeidah port should be allowed into the country, commercial airspace should be reopened, and approval processes for the movement of humanitarian goods and personnel should be streamlined.
The Yemen Humanitarian Response Plan needs to be fully funded. 2016 ended with an unacceptable shortfall of 40% of the needed resources. Funding needs to be flexible and responsive to the challenges of the ground and longer-term development needs.
Donors and governments should engage inside Yemen as well as with regional governments to increase their understanding of the realities of delivering humanitarian assistance but also allow them to build the relationships needed to apply diplomatic pressure in support of the humanitarian response and international humanitarian law.
The conference was a loud call to action. The many contributions throughout the day were a show of unity among humanitarian organisations and local civil society for donors and governments to raise their game and stand by the victims of this war.
Rory Stewart MP, UK Minister of State for International Development, asked to hear more about the challenges faced by the humanitarian sector and how UK Aid particular and the British Government as a whole could assist and inconsistent policies could be resolved. Conference participants spoke about the many innovative solutions that they are implementing and proposing. Rory Stewart said he will have the opportunity to bring the outcome of this meeting to his counterparts in Spring 2017 when donors and governments will meet to discuss Yemen and the looming Famine. Conference participants expressed their hope that besides a generous pledge and support for humanitarian action, the high-level Spring meeting will renew political will for a process to end one of the four most deadly conflicts worldwide.
Yemen – Udai Faisal
In this March 22, 2016 photo, infant Udai Faisal, who is suffering from acute malnutrition, is hospitalized at Al-Sabeen Hospital in Sanaa, Yemen. Udai died on March 24. Hunger has been the most horrific consequence of Yemen’s conflict and spiraled since Saudi Arabia and its allies, backed by the U.S., launched a campaign of airstrikes and a naval blockade in 2015. #
Maad al-Zikry / AP
Yemen – Saida Ahmad Baghili, 18
Saida Ahmad Baghili, 18, who is affected by severe acute malnutrition, sits on a bed at the al-Thawra hospital in the Red Sea port city of Hodeidah, Yemen, on October 24, 2016. Reuters followed Saida’s story after this, and on December 6, reported, “Now, after weeks of specialist hospital care in the capital Sanaa, though she can still barely speak and sometimes finds eating more difficult than ever, she can at least smile.” Nearly two years of war between a Saudi-led Arab coalition and the Iran-allied Houthi movement has deepened the plight of Baghili’s family and millions of other Yemenis. In her parched village on the Red Sea coast, impoverished residents have long struggled to put food on the table. Doctors believe Saida’s condition—which began several years before the war began—has damaged her throat, and when her family first brought her to a regional hospital in October, she could barely keep her eyes open or stand. “We admitted Saida to find out the cause of her inability to eat, and it’s clear that she suffers from severe malnutrition,” Doctor Wasfi al-Zakari of Sanaa’s al-Thawra hospital said. “Her health remains chronic, and her bones remain fragile due to stunted growth. In all likelihood, they will never return to normal,” he said. #
Mothers in the Niger are screening their children for malnutrition
A pilot programme supported by UNICEF and partners has started leveraging the care of mothers to fight malnutrition. The programme distributes bracelets to monitor the growth of their child. It tells the mothers how to read the results, and what action, if any, to take. link
Ebola, Malnutrition, Starvation And Nollywood by Patrick Dele Cole
Bollywood and Nollywood have yet to see any humanitarian work of note. During the 1990s when starvation nearly wiped out many of the children in Ethiopia, it was an English Man Bob Geldorf and an American, Bono, who got fellow artists together to sing “Do they know it is Christmas”.
There was not a squeak from India and Africa. Ebola is here now and these same two musicians – Geldorf at nearly 70 and Bono – are again in the forefront raising money for Ebola victims. – See more follow link
Sierra Leone’s Turtle Islands
Seven months after Sierra Leone’s first Ebola case, the Turtle Islands have now become dependent on food aid. By /Tommy Trenchard/Al Jazeera
Read more
The unwelcome return of development pornography
In June 1981, New Internationalist published ‘Merchants of Misery’, a seminal article by Danish aid worker Jorgen Lissner that launched a blistering attack on the use of images of starving black children in NGO fundraising materials. John Hilary argues, all those years ago, international NGOs have a choice: merchants of misery or they can embrace active forms of solidarity. Read more
Pictures for the FEED project, by Joey L
The portraits in this post were taken to to support my friend Lauren Bush Lauren’s charity, FEED Projects. Lauren and I dreamt up a concept for the shoot over coffee. We would capture portraits of FEED’s celebrity ambassadors and influencers in a studio setting that felt classic, natural, and share a moment of intimacy between friends or business partners. It would be the first major advertising campaign effort for FEED, and although grassroots, the final images would live in a lot of major places, including Vanity Fair, Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, Marie Claire, InStyle, Cosmopolitan, and Elle, just to name a few.
Link www.joeyl.com
My new report: Action to Increase Nutrition
Wondering why you should care about a conference on nutrition? We’ll explain…
On November 19, ministers from 193 countries will meet in Rome for the first time in 22 years to look at ways to tackle malnutrition.
At the Second International Conference on Nutrition (ICN2), they’ll be asked to adopt two documents: the Rome Declaration on Nutrition and the Framework for Action on Nutrition.
Progress in tackling malnutrition since the first ICN in 1992 has been weak and patchy because of inadequate commitment and leadership, financial constraints, weak human and institutional capacities, the depletion of natural resources exacerbated by climate change, and a lack of appropriate accountability mechanisms.
The good news is that today the world is much wealthier than it was 22 years ago, and the knowledge of what works and what action is needed is far more advanced. As momentum on nutrition builds internationally, this conference presents an historic once-in-a-generation opportunity for strong political commitments that could help end child hunger.
Read more: link
Fannie ?
In an effort to reach hundreds of thousands of starving and malnourished people in South Sudan, the first air drops by the International Red Cross in nearly two decades took place in Leer on July 5. Thousands of people waited in the hot sun for emergency food supplies and seed. NBC NEWS
Celebrity needed: Another awful African story South Sudan
The declaration of another Famine is imminent. In the absence of local media able to witness the circumstances it is incumbent on Western media to report the story. Sadly it appears that they need a Hollywood actor to ignite our interest. Strangely the f-word might be a blessing in that if might finally galvanise people’s interest of the conflict. link
Hunger in Afganistan
photographer Daniel Berehulak visting Inpatient Therapeutic Feeding Centre (ITFC) wards, at the Bost Hospital, a Medecins Sans Frontiers (MSF) assisted hospital in Lashkar Gah, in Helmand Province, Afghanistan.
Read more: Daniel Berehulak the Freelancer’s Way
Malakal Feelings Center
A South Sudanese child displaced by the fighting in Malakal, and suffering from malnutrition, cries as he is washed by a nurse at a feeding center run by Medicins sans Frontiers (MSF) in Kodok, Fashoda county, on May 28, 2014. (Reuters/Andreea Campeanu)
The Reshaping of Suffering through the Lens of a Photojournalist
Reflections on Photojournalism off the back of: The Globe and Mail’s article and “The Faces of Famine: Peter Power in Somalia” which illustrates the famine in Somalia, by elevatyourthoughts
Food Crisis Worsens in South Sudan as Civil War Is Displacing Millions
WAU SHILUK, South Sudan — Five months of war in South Sudan has led to the deaths of thousands and the displacement of more than one million people. But officials warn that the tragedy could just be beginning. A serious food crisis is looming over the country, and the United Nations says that if action is not taken immediately, the consequences could be dire.
Lynsey Addario for The New York Times
The Starving Town Of Ganyliel Fighting breeds hunger.
Fighting breeds hunger.
In South Sudan, thousands have been killed in political and ethnic fighting since December. The fighting has disrupted much of daily life and left nearly 7 million at risk of hunger and 3.7 million facing starvation, according to the United Nations. Last week, Peter Biro of the International Rescue Committee visited the northern town of Ganyliel, South Sudan. Link
ACCESS FOR ALL: nutrition success stories from West Pokot / Kenya
This series on the Action Against Hunger Webbed, has been developed off the back of a Trip I posed on this blog earlier I travel across the region to determine how many children are malnourished and how many of those are able to access treatment. We walked house-to-house visiting families, to find out what barriers mothers face and what solutions could work. See the resulting pictures and video by following this link as well as full report following here. All material
Copyright S Hauenstein Swan
Colombia civil war and hunger
COLOMBIA – NOVEMBER 2007: A father displays the body of his dead son in his arms. Fighting in the area meant that the child could not be evacuated from the village for medical treatment, so died of hunger and diarrhea. The presence of the different active armed groups within local communities is one of the main reasons for the displacement of civilians. (Photo by Alvaro Ybarra Zavala/Edit by Getty Images)
Niger: Tackling Life-Threatening Malnutrition
When her small twins Ousseina and Alassane got thinner and thinner, their mother Zali brought them to the local health centre in the small village of Grado in Niger. Both twins were suffering from severe acute malnutrition, which can be fatal if left untreated. Photo Copyright S.Hauenstein Swan
Mali After the Coup
Mali, a West African nation of 15 million people, is facing serious hardship following a March coup d’etat that has since collapsed. Islamist militant groups have filled the void, forming an extremist mini-state in northern Mali, resulting in sanctions imposed by other African nations. The collapse of state governance has chased away foreign investment, and tourism has dropped precipitously. Djenne, a UNESCO World Heritage-listed town, saw its annual tourist count drop from more than 10,000 to fewer than 20 total foreign visitors this year. Although Mali’s cotton and gold industries appear to be weathering the insecurity well so far, future development is on hold as the interim government in the south works to resolve issues with the patchwork of militant Islamists and Tuareg separatists who rule the north. Reuters photographer Joe Penney has spent months in Mali this year, returning with many photos such as these collected here. [28 photos] link
Thebronxpapers's Blog 
18 Hour Day with One Meal Only
Photo and Text: Samuel Hauenstein Swan – www.SamBronx-Photo.com
Part IV of the Descendent of the Hyena Series.
We ask the elder in the villages about his daily routine in the growing season. “my wife and I get up at about five o’clock in the morning,” he begins, and head out right away to the fields, to beat the heat that is building up very quickly. We try to get most of the farm work – which is at that time of the year mostly weeding and ensure the soil is not to compact around the base of the plants, so the rain gets to the roots quickly – before one o’clock n the afternoon.
By the time we reach home, it is nearly two it is we have our first meal.
During the months where we have the most work on the farms, we also have the least reserves in the kitchen. We often have just that lunch meal, and in the evening we make some tea with sugar.
These hunger season meals lack both in quantity and quality. It is often just as much that a headache is going but never as much that we feel full. During this month of the year, it is only porridge we dilute with much water and give a bit of tasing by adding wild leaves and hot spices.
“Hunger in the village and the region has to do with poverty and secondary with rains.” Zara’s neighbours explain: ”the rain permit only one harvest. The better off villages have the low grounds close to the river and with fertile soil to make most of the few spots of rain. The others have the fields that are higher and on slopes where the water runs off, and the most fertile ground is missing. These areas give little and even in good years are sufficient to feed the family. They also have no surplus to bring to the markets and gain cash to purchase food later in the season. Once their stocks are empty Zara, and families like hers must hope for occasional work in exchange for a meal.
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January 17, 2018 | Categories: Analysis, commentry, Local Voices, photo | Tags: anthropology, children, chronic malnutrition, Environment, equality, Food Crisis, food security, food systems, humanitarian crisis, hunger, local civil society, malnutrition, Niger, nutrition, photo essays, photographer, Photojournalism, photojournalist, Sahel Food Crisis, small holder farmers, West Africa | 2 Comments