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Kenyan pastoralists struggle to adapt to worsening droughtDate : 30/11/2009 Publication
: German Press Agency dpa Category
: Feature
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You smell the carcasses before you see them, the hot equatorial breeze wafting the cloying stench of death across the arid Kenyan plain.
Over a dozen corpses are embedded in the dry, dusty soil, jawbones protruding from withered, pockmarked hides and the blackened remains of rotting organs leaking from exposed rib cages.
These bodies by the side of a rutted track leading to Badana - a settlement of a few thousand livestock herders known as pastoralists - are stark evidence of the fierce drought that has gripped the East African nation this year.
Local officials estimate 30 per cent of the livestock in the Isiolo South constituency, in which Badana lies, have died this year due to the drought, which aid agencies say is part of a worsening cycle of failed rains brought on by climate change.
Cyclical droughts are part of life in much of Africa, but Liban Mohamad, regional manager for the Kenyan Red Cross in Upper Eastern District, says the dry spells are becoming more frequent and longer.
"When we were young, we experienced drought every five or six years," he says. "Now it is yearly or every two years. This year we had four out of five rivers dry up for the first time."
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