Iraq
In Danger Of Starvation, Says UN
By Helena Smith, Nicosia
and Ed Vulliamy in Baghdad
The Observer
13 May, 2003
Iraqi agriculture is on the
brink of collapse, with fears that many of its 24.5 million people will
go hungry this summer, according to a confidential report being studied
by the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation.
A special assessment prepared
by the UN agency's staff in Rome, which has been seen by The Observer,
reveals a catastrophe in the making, with crops and poultry being especially
hard hit.
Government warehouses that
would have served as the main suppliers of seeds, fertilisers and pesticide
sprays have been looted, particularly in the centre and south of the
country.
Iraqi farmers should now
be planting tomatoes and onions, potatoes, cucumbers, water melon, peppers,
beans and squash. But without seeds, fertilisers and pesticides, that
will be hard - a situation exacerbated by the collapse of the pumping
stations that powered the irrigation schemes on which the vegetable
crop depends.
'Vegetables and poultry are
particularly important because they are the main source of protein,
vitamins, minerals and a host of micro-nutrients that are missing from
the oil-for-food basket which is also why malnutrition is endemic in
Iraq,' said spokesman Barry Came.
Sixty per cent of the population
has depended on the oil-for-food programme, instituted at the end of
the 1991Gulf war. Under the programme, Iraq received supplies of wheat,
pulses and flour in exchange for oil.
The FAO calls the report
a 'preliminary desk assessment' and is expected to release a statement
commenting on its main points by Wednesday.
In the southern and central
areas, vital irrigation networks have been destroyed, a once-thriving
poultry industry has been ruined and there are predictions of disease
and pestilence among both plants and animals.
Enormous difficulties are
anticipated in harvesting winter crops, 1.2 million tons of wheat, barley,
rice and maize. Under Saddam, harvesting normally started this month,
with a touring fleet of ageing combined harvesters.
Lack of spare parts had long
put a strain on the harvesters available and now no mechanism exists
for purchasing the yield. In previous years, the Ministry of Trade bought
the crop, stored it and arranged for banks to pay farmers, who in turn
used the revenues to buy the seeds for their summer vegetable crops.
But this year no seeds have
been planted because, even if the farmers had money to buy them, most
of the seed stock has been looted or destroyed.
Iraqi's poultry industry,
source of the half of the animal protein eaten by the population, is
also in dire straits. All the soybean and protein concentrate feed stored
in government warehouses was stolen, along with vaccines, drugs and
medicines required to keep the stock healthy.
Both the major poultry projects
that once supplied Iraqi chicken farmers with layers and hatching eggs
have collapsed. Thousands of birds have starved to death.
Animal health is another
major concern. Most of the veterinary hospitals and clinics were looted
or destroyed, and vehicles, drugs, medicines and food ingredients disappeared.
The impact could be severe
in a country where disease is rife among the 18 million sheep and goats
and three million cattle. Some are capable of transmission to humans,
so constant control is required.
The warning came as America's
efforts to get Iraq's Health Ministry up and running twisted into farce
yesterday, when it emerged that the new Minister concerned was a Saddam
crony.
Dr Ali Shnan Janabi, former
number three in Saddam's infamously corrupt Ministry, was presented
to an all-day conference of doctors. His appointment was greeted with
disbelief and charges of corruption from many doctors.
Dr Hussein Harith, a senior
registrar at the al-Mansour teaching hospital, said Dr Shnan was one
of a 'group of senior Ministers who asked the directors of hospitals
to report that they did not need drugs and medicines [supplied to Iraq
under the oil-for-food programme], even though they were desperate for
them.
There were happier scenes
in Basra, where the 63-year-old leader of Iraq's biggest Shia group
returned from exile yesterday. Supporters waved flags and chanted slogans
when the convoy of Ayatollah Mohammed Baqir al-Hakim crossed into Iraq
from Iran, where he has led the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution
in Iraq since 1980.
Thousands lined the 12-mile
road from the border to Basra, where up to 100,000 people packed a stadium
to listen to him address them for the first time in 23 years.