Drought puts 350,000 people at risk in northern Burundi

BUSONI, Burundi (Reuters) -- More than 350,000 people in northern Burundi have been hit by a prolonged drought that has ravaged most of east Africa, the United Nations said Monday.

Already suffering the effects of a seven-year civil war, the people of northern Burundi are now facing hunger after four years of poor harvests.

Around the town of Busoni, around 130 miles north of the capital in Kirundo province, crowds of children with clear signs of malnutrition walk through dried-up sorghum fields that haven't received a drop of rain for three months.

"We have not eaten today," said 45-year-old Cassilda Banyansekera. "We are not sure if we will get anything."

Once a wealthy family of peasants who produced a surplus of food, Banyansekera at best has just half a kilo of beans to share each day among her family of eight.

Evarist Kagimbangabo, the head of the local administration, said six people had died from the effects of hunger in recent weeks.

"People plant, but they get no harvest. This is a real catastrophe," he told Reuters. "If no one intervenes, by the end of July many more people will be dying."

The U.N.'s World Food Program estimates that at least 350,000 people from Kirundo's population of 550,000 have been put at risk by the drought.

"The situation is serious in Kirundo and dramatic in Busoni and Bugabira communes," John Aylieff from the WFP in Burundi said. "Significant amounts of food will be needed."

But he said if a distribution of 35,000 tons of food goes ahead as planned, a "mass loss of lives" could be averted.

In Busoni's once-bustling market, a few hawkers selling beans look for business.

But the beans have quadrupled in price over the last few months, and few people can afford to buy.

The solution for many residents of Busoni has been to pack up and leave for neighboring Rwanda. About 10,000 of Busoni's population of 100,000 have left, while many more are working as day laborers across the border.

One man, Giririmana, said he is working in Rwanda three to four days a week to feed his wife and two children. His three other children died last month.

"I was ill and could not work to get food, so they died," he said.

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