Rain will reach most parts of the country this week, but it will ease the drought only slightly.
The Met department told Kenyans not to expect much rain between now and January.
“The weather outlook for November 2022 to January 2023 indicates that the whole country will experience below-average rainfall and warmer-than-average temperatures,” head of meteorological services Dr David Gikungu said in a statement.
The drought will worsen because the rains will be depressed and end early next month in Mandera, Garissa, Marsabit, Wajir, Isiolo, Turkana and Samburu.
About four million Kenyans, mostly from the arid north, have been painfully lining up for food aid in the past two months.
“The northeastern and northwestern regions are likely to remain generally dry throughout the forecast period but may experience occasional rainfall especially in November and early December,” Dr Gikungu said.
“The expected rainfall is therefore not likely to be adequate for recovery from the current poor nutrition and food security situation,” Gikungu said.
The below average rains are a result of La Nina – the opposite of El Nino – which brings dry weather to Kenya.
The region is undergoing going through a negative Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD), which leads to dry weather over Eastern Africa.
Despite the depressed rains, isolated episodes of heavy storms are still likely to occur in several parts of the country during the month.
According to the Ministry of Agriculture, this year’s maize harvest is projected to be 33 million bags of 90 kgs, and this will be the lowest in a period of five years.
Maize production in 2021 was 38 million bags and 42 million bags in 2020. 44.0 million and 44.6 million bags in 2019 and 2018 while 2017 saw the country harvest about 35.4 million bags of 90 kgs.
The targeted maize production this year was 67.3 million bags which is higher than the 2021 target of 61.2 million bags.
“This is against the total national maize demand of 57.8 million bags of 90kg annually,” the ministry data showed.
Met also said the availability of pasture, browse, and water for livestock consumption will deteriorate.
“Therefore, it is advised that relevant authorities closely monitor the situation to prevent any loss of livestock,” Dr Gikungu said.
The National Drought Management Authority (NDMA) said currently, 4.35 million Kenyans are in need of food aid.
This is based on the 2022 long rain food and nutritional security assessment report. NDMA October drought early warning bulletin showed that the drought situation continues to worsen in twenty (20) of the 23 ASAL counties.
This is attributed to the four successive failed rain seasons which has led to an increase in the number of people in need of humanitarian assistance from four million in August to the current 4.35 million people.
Eleven counties namely; Garissa, Isiolo, Kajiado, Kitui, Mandera, Marsabit, Laikipia, Samburu, Tana River, Turkana, Wajir, are in alarm drought phase while nine counties including Embu, Kilifi, Kwale, Makueni, Meru, Narok, Nyeri, Tharaka Nithi and Taita Taveta are in the alert drought phase.
The remaining three counties including Baringo, West Pokot and Lamu are in a normal drought phase.
NDMA further indicated that acute malnutrition has also been noted across the counties with 942,000 cases of children aged 6-59 months acutely malnourished and 134,000 cases of pregnant or lactating women acutely malnourished in need of treatment.
