In 2020, the most abundant rainfall of the last 65 years was recorded while this year, on the contrary, the rainy season was slow to arrive. Climate change is tangible, hinders humanitarian action and brings the country to its knees
Last year’s rainy season, in addition to having caused the White Nile and many other waterways to overflow in an exceptional way, has strongly affected the so-called “Sudd” area, the largest swampy area in Africa with a frightening amount of water, which has not returned to the levels of the dry season to this day. This year’s rains were delayed by at least 4 months, starting in late July instead of April, and have left some dry areas, weighting on the population’s subsistence and creating alarming situations in those areas where last year’s water is stagnant.
“In South Sudan climate change is tangible” INTERSOS head of mission, Stefano Antichi says. “The irregular rains – he explains – lead to an alteration of the agricultural cycle, in fact this year they arrived late”. Humanitarian programmes in the country have suffered from this out of phase rainfall calendar.
One of the main humanitarian activities in South Sudan is the distribution of food and livelihood kits, containing seeds and agricultural tools. Once sown, the rains did not arrive, then creating inconvenience and the revision of plans. Stefano Antichi tells us that “The biggest problem we struggle with every day is the accessibility to certain areas, making humanitarian work and communications difficult“. South Sudan has a very fragile balance. It does not have a developed road system and the airports are dirt tracks, which become inaccessible when it rains, while the roads turn into rivers. During the rainy period it then becomes very difficult to support the communities living in the most remote areas. Much more than in other countries, the weather situation affects people’s lives because they entirely depend on the alternation of the rainy season with the dry one“.
Climate change’s effects on South Sudan’s internal balance
The instability of the rainy season has exacerbated food insecurity: 60% of the population does not have regular and daily access to food. In 2020, South Sudan declared famine, at the highest emergency levels in some areas, including the counties of Akobo and Pibor, which are tangible cases of climate change’s effect. In South Sudan, the typical soil is called black cotton soil, because it recalls the ability of cotton to soak and retain water. The subsistence of the local population depends on pastoralism and this leads to frequent movements of the population, in search of foraging for the animals.
More than half of the population depends on food distributions by humanitarian agencies that are also dependent on accessibility. “For six months we did not have access to some areas of the State of Jonglei, because the helicopter was unable to land due to the muddy runways and so the deployments were delayed. These characteristics make the humanitarian intervention very complex”.
Where local markets have a more or less regular supply of food, such as Akobo, INTERSOS guarantees cash distribution for the purchase of food on site, which is implemented alongside a training program aimed at members of local communities on techniques agricultural and fishing, with an eye to sustainability and resilience to climate change. This last element is also responsible – in part – for the worsening of the already very fragile peace in the country. The famine has exacerbated conflicts between different communities, which in the last months of 2021 caused many deaths in rural areas and even more than 10 victims among humanitarian workers. The future of South Sudan today is more uncertain than ever because of famine, an internal conflict that is escalating and a population that must struggle every day to survive.