Floods and worms destroyed crops in Warawar, South Sudan, causing a food shortage.

The Warawar paramount chief, in Aweil East County, Northern Bahr el Ghazal State, has warned that his people lack food and fear impending hunger since their crops were ruined by major floods and autumn armyworm infestation.

Atak Awan Anei explains in a Radio Tamazuj broadcast viewed by NCMP that the current floods impacted both the high and low lands, leaving last year’s harvest unusable.

“There is inadequate grain in Warawar as a consequence of floods and autumn armyworm,” Chief Awan remarked. “All high and lower lands were impacted by the two issues.”

He appealed to humanitarian organizations to help his neighbors with food handouts and seedlings ahead of next year’s agricultural season.

Peter Garang, a native of Warwar, stated their harvest failed but nobody has come to their rescue. “We have numerous issues because our crops failed and humanitarian groups overlook certain afflicted regions and pick others,” Garang added.

Kiir Yor Lual, the Aweil East County commissioner verified the agricultural failure and the grim food security scenario.

“Yes, it is true. “There is an agricultural failure in most regions in Aweil East County and the causes of the loss of the crop were the autumn armyworms and most of the lowlands were washed by the floods,” Commissioner Yor stated.

He said he is worried about the approaching famine since an evaluation done by humanitarian groups predicted that 19,000 extended families would be in severe need of help.

“There was a low crop in 2021 and that is one of the reasons we are concerned about the famine situation in 2022. There was an evaluation carried out by the inter-agencies and the total persons discovered impacted are 19,000 households,’’ he added.

Asked whether the residents had received any humanitarian help, Commissioner Yor admitted that the humanitarian partners had supplied food rations for the last three months to the impacted villages.

He stated that the state administration purchased food from neighboring Sudan, but it has not been imported yet owing to instability along the route from Sudan.