'STARVING' SWAZIS EAT WEEDS

Many people in Swaziland are so hungry that they have to eat weeds to survive.

This is another news report you won’t have read in the Swazi media.

As I wrote before if you really want to know what is going on in the kingdom of Swaziland don’t bother with the local media.

The following news report was released by the IRIN and sent across the world. You can read the full report here

While aid agencies and the Swazi government scramble to keep a major catastrophe at bay, the mounting food crisis means more and more Swazis can only cope by drastically scaling down food intake and scouring the fields for edible weeds.

About 40 percent of Swaziland's one million people are facing acute food and water shortages. For most, coping with the food scarcity means cutting back on depleted consumption, already endangering the health of thousands according to Comparisons of Coping Mechanisms 2006/2007, a recently released joint annual study by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and World Food Programme (WFP).

‘Over 50 percent of adults are eating less. Over 60 percent are limiting or reducing meal portions. Over 30 percent of the population is skipping meals entirely,’ the report said. ‘Those not eating for an entire day or consuming a green [wild] crop, grew - over 30 percent of Swazis are consuming more than the usual amount of wild foods.’

Samantha Simelane, a widow with two daughters, is one of them, ‘The children cry that their bellies are hurting them; I feel so sorry for them," she said. "I am famished myself, so I feel weak most times, but I tell my children if we eat what little we have instead of stretching it out, we will surely starve at some point.’