NATURE’S FURY UNLEASHED

A joint survey by the WFP and Sri Lanka government found that 31 percent of households affected by floods in early 2013 are severely food-insecure, while 44 percent of households are borderline food-insecure. Sixty-eight percent of total household expenditure is allocated to food. According to the World Bank, if a household spends more than 65 percent of its expenditure on food, the vulnerability to food insecurity is very high.Thirteen percent of flood-affected households were identified as having poor food consumption levels, and a third covered by the survey were found to have borderline food consumption scores. Currently, 41 percent of flood-affected households are adopting high and negative coping mechanisms such as skipping meals and limiting meal portions, eating less-preferred food, pawning assets and borrowing cash. This, the report says, indicates that households have had little time to recover after the drought, and that their food and livelihood security is becoming increasingly parlous. – http://lmd.lk/2013/06/01/climate-change-3/

This entry was posted in Agriculture, Amantha Perera, Climate Change, Drought, Extreme weather events, Floods and tagged , , , , , , by Amantha Perera. Bookmark the permalink.

About Amantha Perera

Amantha Perera is a writer and a multi-media journalist based in Colombo, Sri Lanka. His work regularly appears in TIME, Reuters/AlertNet (Thomson Reuters Foundation), Inter Press News Service – IPS , and Integrated Regional Information Network – IRIN. He concentrates on coverage on Sri Lanka’s post-conflict situation, humanitarian aid, human rights, climate change and impact on the region and adaptation measures. He has worked extensively in the region and reported from the US, Brazil, India, South Korea, Thailand, Indonesia and Nepal. He was an International Visiting Scholar at the Graduate School of Journalism, University of California, Berkeley, California in 2003/04. He was also part of a team that was awarded the 2012 Prince Albert/United Nations Global Prize for Climate Change reporting awarded to IPS for its coverage of the Rio+20 Conference. He began his journalism at the Sri Lankan weekly The Sunday Leader in 1998. Twitter: @AmanthaP

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