Disaster Management Fund to be set up this year in Mozambique – official

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Disaster Management Fund to be set up this year in Mozambique – official

9:43 CAT | 10 Jun 2017

Lusa (File photo)

The Mozambican government’s Management Disaster Technical Council (CTGC) revealed in Maputo on Friday that a Disaster Management Fund will be approved some time later this year.

According to Joao Machatine, the general director of the country’s relief agency, the National Disaster Management Institute (INGC), setting up such a fund is in obedience to a guideline from the government.

The fund is being discussed as fears rise that southern Africa could, in the 2017-2018 agricultural year, be hit once again by the El Nino weather phenomenon.

El Nino – or, to give it its full name, the El Nino Southern Oscillation – is an anomalous warming of the surface waters of the central and eastern Pacific Ocean. This disrupts rainfall patterns across the globe, and in southern Africa it is associated with drought.

The last El Nino affected the 2015-2016 agricultural year, causing severe drought across much of southern and central Mozambique. It is now suspected – though it is by no means certain – that another El Nino will hit the coming agricultural year.

The CTGC met to draw up strategies to ensure that Mozambique will be ready to face future disasters.

Addressing the opening session of the meeting, Machatine said “There are strong signs that we shall have another El Nino, and so we must, in advance, draw up strategies to guarantee that situations identical to those of previous years do not recur”. He urged each sector – particularly agriculture, water resources and health – to plan in advance for the possible El Nino.

Asked later by reporters about the new fund, the spokesperson for the meeting, Paulo Tomas, could not give any date for when it would be set up. He guaranteed that such a fund would ease the pressures on the state budget during periods of emergency.

Source: AIM