KENYA: NGOs find high rates of malnutrition in Turkana District

NAIROBI, 26 March 2004 (IRIN) - A survey carried out by World Vision (WV) in Turkana District, northwestern Kenya, has found high levels of malnutrition among the local population. In a statement issued on Friday, WV said the worst rates were recorded in the fishing community of Natole in the southern zone of the district, where 30 percent of children were found to be "malnourished and showing signs of marasmus". An earlier survey carried out by Oxfam in the district's eastern zone had found a malnutrition rate of 34.3 percent, "indicating a crisis situation for the two zones of the district", it said. The situation in Natole was being made worse by commercial fishing, WV noted. "Although the people of Natole live along Lake Turkana, they do not have access to the fish that come from the lake," the report quoted Charles Otieno, a local official as saying. The fish were being taken by traders to other areas where higher prices obtained, he added. WV said the community was relying on hard palm tree fruits for food, crushed into a powder to make it into a meal known as "makoma", which, "if eaten in large quantities", could cause diarrhoea. James Eyapan, the drought management officer in Lodwar, the district capital, was quoted as saying that the nutritional problem was exacerbated by "the inability of the land to recover from the effects of the last drought". WV was "urgently negotiating with the Kenya government to provide food for those worst off", the statement said. WV Canada, it added, had already committed 10 percent of the of its Area Development Plan budget to the emergency. A recent assessment made jointly by the Kenyan government, WV and other relief agencies had found that over a million people across Kenya were in need of food assistance, the statement noted.