1 minute read
No life without livestock
No life without livestock
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Fatuma Abdullah (30), mother of Taslima and Musbita and wife of Sefi Abdullah from Jido Gari village, Oromia, Ethiopia, says she has nothing. “We can no longer harvest anything from our own land. The drought is enormous. Our cows hardly have anything to drink, and there is no more grass to graze. Selling a cow on the market is no longer possible either. We had ten cows, but five have already died. I’m afraid we’re going to lose the last five, too. Then I can no longer give our children milk.”
Fatuma continues: “Before the drought, I put a cow in front of the plow to prepare our field for sowing. I milked my cows and fed my children with the milk. I went to the market and sold an ox to buy medicine for my other cows, but the cows died anyway. Now I have lost my strong ox and my cows. My family is hungry. We have no food for today. We are trying to grow some vegetables, but we don’t really know how to do that.”
ZOA helps families like Fatuma’s with special seeds and agricultural training. Without this help, their lives will become increasingly miserable, possibly resulting in severe malnutrition or starvation. Or they might be forced to move to another place in hopes of finding food there.
