Pakistan Conflict Monitor

IDP Malnutrition Strikes First Along Gender Lines

Last in Line for Food, IRIN News, 5 April 2010

EXCERPT: "'We girls and our mothers eat last, after my four brothers, cousin and our fathers have finished. Sometimes there is almost nothing left to eat - but we are used to this,' Nasreena Bibi, 12, from northwestern Pakistan’s Bajaur tribal agency, told IRIN. Her family has been based since early 2009 with an uncle in the town of Kohat, in North West Frontier Province (NWFP), after fleeing clashes between the army and Taliban militants. Nasreena and her mother help her aunt cook for the 14 people living in the four-room house. But, like the other girls and women, she only eats a tiny fraction of what she prepares. 'The pattern is common in many homes. Women and girls get less to eat, as they are considered to need less food than men,' said Aisha Bibi, 40, a female health worker. 'We try to educate people about the risks if expecting mothers, or girls who will one day become mothers, do not get enough to eat.' Some 12 percent of children screened in displaced families, and their hosts, suffer moderate or acute malnutrition, with girls making up 58 percent of those affected, according to a 2 April humanitarian update by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). Health worker Bibi said the 'strained food situation' in the homes of hosts supporting internally displaced persons (IDPs) for many months could be adding to nutritional problems."

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Related reports:
Determinants of food security in rural areas in Pakistan, Munich Personal RePEc Archive, 16 February 2009
Women's status and children's food security in Pakistan, United Nations University // World Institute for Development Economics Research, June 2006
The importance of women's status for child nutrition in development countries, International Food Policy Research Institute via the Human Security Gateway, 1 January 2004

Related posts:
UN relies on local mills to combat hunger, 18 March 2010
"Anti-terrorist" fertilizer ban hinders farmers, 2 February 2010

UN Relies on Local Mills to Combat Hunger

UN Agency Uses Local Mills in Pakistan's Swat Valley to Improve Access to Food, UN News Service, 17 March 2010

EXCERPT: "The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) announced today that it has contracted eight mills in Pakistan’s conflict-affected Swat Valley to produce fortified wheat flour in a bid to boost the local economy and make food more easily accessible to families in the area. [...] 'The combination of conflict and high food prices since the humanitarian crisis started has been devastating to many people in the Swat Valley,' said Wolfgang Herbinger, WFP’s representative in Pakistan. 'Milling flour locally will help support local business amid constant insecurity as well as increase availability of flour,' he added. The locally produced wheat flour is also expected to stabilize prices, which were already high globally before the start of the conflict and soared again when conflict escalated in the Swat Valley in the summer of 2009."

Read the full story.

Related articles:
Asia's food crisis driving broader trade shifts, World Policy Review, 18 March 2010
Pakistan at "extreme food security risk", DAWN, 8 September 2009

Related posts:
"Anti-terrorist" fertilizer ban hinders farmers, 2 February 2010

"Anti-Terrorist" Fertilizer Ban Hinders Farmers

"Anti-Terrorist" Fertilizer Ban Hinders Farmers, IRIN News, 2 February 2010

EXCERPT: "The ban on ammonium sulfate, ammonium nitrate and calcium ammonium nitrate fertilizers was imposed in Malakand Division - comprising the Dir, Swat, Chitral and Malakand districts of North West Frontier Province (NWFP) - in November 2009 by the NWFP government, following reports that those chemicals were used by militants to make explosives... In Khar, the principal town of Bajaur, 40-year-old farmer Mobeen Khan told IRIN that the ban was affecting crop yields and food security. 'Without these, we cannot farm our lands,' Khan said. 'Already crops have been badly affected and many farmers are desperate to save what they can. We need the crops not only to sell but to feed our own families, or they will starve. There is no choice now but to buy fertilizers at inflated rates from smugglers who bring them in from neighbouring districts, especially Lower Dir."...While the ban is supposed to be only for fertilizers that contain nitrates, Khan alleged that all kinds of fertilizers had been banned in Bajaur and shops previously selling them had been closed down. 'In some cases this is just a means used to harass people or extort bribes,' Khan said."

Read the full story.

Related articles:
Pakistan's food security under threat, say experts: Indians’ presence at Siachen causes rapid glacier melting, DAWN, 7 December 2009
No food security risk for Pakistan: Food ministry, DAWN, 8 September 2009
Improved farming rather than more food aid?, IRIN News, 9 July 2009
Half of Pakistan population at the risk of food insecurity, warns WFP, Thaindian, 5 April 2008

Related media and reports:
Hunger pains: Pakistan's food insecurity [video and summary], Wilson Center, 3 June 2009
Food insecurity in rural Pakistan 2003, Sustainable Development Policy Institute, 2003

Related posts:
Water challenges a "crucial" issue in Central-South Asia, 19 January 2010

Water Challenges a "Crucial" Issue in Central-South Asia

Water Challenges in Central-South Asia, Norwegian Peacebuilding Centre, December 2009

EXCERPT: "Water issues play a crucial role in Central-South Asia, both in the quantity of water available and its quality. Access to clean drinking water is a major, though largely unmet, objective. While much of the region is experiencing water shortages, poor water management lies at the heart of many problems. Climate change — in the form of glacier melt, drought, rising temperatures, and changes to the monsoon cycle — will increasingly exacerbate water scarcity. Although the region’s water challenges do not necessarily or inevitably lead to armed conflict, they increasingly threaten to undermine human security. . . Agriculture offers a livelihood for over 40% of Pakistan’s labour force and accounts for a quarter of GDP. Agriculture is also the dominant water user with 69% of the total, while industries use 23% and households the remaining 8%. . . Extensive irrigation in Pakistan and India places Indus water resources under heavy stress, with about 90% of the basin’s available water flow utilized. . . Population growth and increasing urbanization and industrialization continue to drive up water demand for drinking, irrigation, and hydropower purposes. There are many internal water conflicts between vidual communities or provinces. But transborder issues have also posed vexing problems."

Read the full report.

Related articles:
India spars with Pakistan, China over water, Asia Sentinel, 19 January 2010
Water shortage to cause 40 percent decline in wheat output, The Nation [Pakistan], 19 January 2010
Islamabad to harvest run-off water, DAWN, 19 January 2010
Reduced Himalayan snowfall could spark water war, AlertNet, 18 January 2010
Future scarcity seen sparking local conflicts, not full-scale wars, The New York Times, 23 December 2009
Kashmir's biggest glacier shrinking faster than others, The Gazette, Montreal, 13 October 2009