‘Animals so weak they can’t stand’
emaciated cow’s ribs stood out, skin taught over a skeletal frame as six farmers hauled it to its feet in a cloud of dust.
The animal had collapsed near the water troughs in Sericho, exhausted and on the brink of starvation with wasted limbs too weak to support it.
Deep in north-east Kenya, the remote town’s residents have seen their livelihoods decimated by the worst drought since 1984.
They are pastoralists who depend on livestock and do not want to leave their ancestral homeland. But as conditions worsen, the farmers are looking to diversify for the first time in generations by turning to agriculture.
Four consecutive failed rainy seasons – with a fifth anticipated – have left the plains surrounding Sericho in Isiolo County devoid of pasture and scattered with livestock bones.
The town’s 10,000 animals (cows, sheep, goats and a few camels) have dwindled to just 5,700, leaving families without their usual supply of meat and milk. Those remaining are so weak they are of little value and farmers are struggling to put food on the table amid a cost of living crisis.
Jones Agole, 60, has just five cows left out of a herd of 40. He must provide for his wife and six children aged between seven and 16.
He said: “Some animals are so weak they cannot stand on their own so families have to come together and lift their cows up to give them a fighting chance.
“There is a lot of hunger in my home.We depend on the government for food aid right now. I’m very afraid of what the future holds.”
Some farmers have moved cattle to their homesteads to nurse them back to health. But this adds to pressure as they must find food for the animals as well as their families.
The scarcity of water is also causTHE
ing conflict with neighbouring communities. A borehole created with funding from the British Red Cross in January provided a muchneeded lifeline for the community.
Sericho allows its neighbours to pay a small fee to access the water but people have been killed in desperate fights that erupt over access.
Adan Salesa, 65, provides for his wife and 12 children, plus six more the couple have adopted.
His herd of 200 cows has shrunk to 50. A healthy bull could fetch 70,000 Kenyan Shillings, or £500, he said. Now the largest of his weakened animals is worth only 10,000KS (£72). Adan said: “Before I could sell one cow and that would cater for my entire family but now the cows are emaciated and can’t fetch a good price.
“I feel hopeless because my entire herd could be finished within a short time.”
Adan’s family eats one meal a day and he said he knows of others who “do not even light their fires [to cook] for two to three days”.
He added: “Before there was a lot of milk, milk was like water.The children were growing fast.
“Things have changed. For the children there is a lot of diarrhoea. At times when they don’t get food they skip school.”
Adan said growing demand meant the water supply was not enough. He explained: “Initially when the borehole was made it was just to be used by the humans.
“The animals also became dependent on that water source so the gensets [generators that pump the water] are not enough.”
The community is relying on aid from the government and agencies like the Red Cross to help them survive the crisis. But Sericho’s residents are determined to become more resilient so they will be prepared for future droughts.
They want to learn agricultural skills to grow drought-resistant crops and build an irrigation system that would allow them to keep water in reserve in storage tanks.
Adan explained that the community cannot simply move to another area as they have deep ties to their land – and moving can trigger conflict.
He said: “Our neighbours are experiencing the same things. Here it’s peaceful. If you move, in some places people are fighting and killing each other.”
Sericho’s chief, Mohamed
Rashid, said he believed that with help they could rebuild and have a brighter future.
He added: “The land is good, the soil is good. But the biggest challenge is water.”
The Daily Express travelled to Sericho with a Kenya Red Cross (KRC) team, which has supported the town by digging the borehole and running schemes to help families buy essentials.
Jeff Otieno, disaster management programme officer at the KRC, said: “It is important to listen and understand the challenges that many communities are facing.
“The Kenya Red Cross is on the ground helping communities and will continue to do so
as the crisis deepens.”