Disaster looms as drought pushes farmers to the brink

A survey released last week by the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) confirms what many around the country already fear: the poor rains in the first half of the season and their inconsistency in the second have driven away farmers from the fields, blighted crops and left livestock teetering on the brink.

While in the 2016/17 season, a record 100,250 farmers planted a record 384,250 hectares, this year’s El Nino effect dried up the first half of the rain season, keeping even the most optimistic of farmers off the fields.“Since the start of the 2018/19 cropping season in October, anomalous dry conditions have developed across parts of Southern Africa, with more intense moisture deficits registered in Botswana, Namibia and South Africa,” reads the FAO report.