After the horrendous floods this winter in Somerset and along the Thames Valley there are many people facing the long and arduous prospect of recovery and repair to their damaged homes and their disrupted lives. It takes many, many months before homes are habitable once again. Then there is also the damage to the infrastructure to consider. Once the water has drained away then repairs have to be made to roads, bridges, sewerage pipes, harbour walls, sea defences, railway lines, electricity lines and telephone cables. The list is almost endless and very, very expensive. Luckily here in the UK we tend to have home insurance and a government that has enough resources to assist with the rebuilding and repairs programme. Other countries are not so lucky. Those of us not affected by the floods tend to forget about them once they are no longer headline news. I thought we should take a look at how one of our favourite African destinations, Mozambique, is faring, one year on from the disastrous floods of January 2013.
Mozambique regularly suffers major floods including in both 2000 and 2001. However it was this time last year that Mozambique suffered one of the worst floods in recent memory. The UN reported that 250,000 people were affected, at least 95 people died and nearly 100,000 were displaced. The flooding occurred in the southern part of Mozambique when heavy rains meant that the Limpopo burst its banks. The river covered a huge area devastating towns like Chokwe and Xai Xai in the southern Gaza region and water levels reached as high as 8 metres, around 25 feet. The government response to the flooding crises has improved massively since the early days, but Mozambique is still a developing nation with a poor infrastructure and where half the population live on less than a dollar a day. Thankfully the UN, the Red Cross/Crescent and other NGOs arrived to help. Enormous temporary camps of up to 70,000 people at a time where set up and food, water and medical assistance brought in swiftly preventing an even bigger humanitarian disaster.
A year on and things are definitely not yet back to normal and there are still plenty of signs of what happened a year ago. Community warning systems worked well and despite a huge area being flooded the number of deaths was kept relatively low. These warning systems are run by local Red Cross volunteers and are impressive in their simplicity but effectiveness. It is hoped that this can be built on for the future into some kind of effective flood warning and response scheme across the country and its neighbours.
With the damage to buildings and infrastructure being so significant there is some rebuilding going on. However for the people of Chokwe and neighbouring towns the news is not so good; they are still stuck living in makeshift camps. Few people in the area have jobs and they have no homes to return to and no money to rebuild them. Long term plans have been discussed in Mozambique just like they have here in the UK. Dams and dykes have been raised as ideas for future flood prevention but these are expensive and not always effective. More popular is the idea to rehouse people on higher ground around the temporary camps. Agriculture land is being offered for resettlement and farming in the area. People could have a main home high in the hills and then a temporary one down on the flood basin where the majority of farming takes place. This sounds like a far better solution and unlike in the UK, there is plenty of land and space for this to happen. Let’s hope that a decent solution is found and quickly for both Mozambique and those affected here in the UK.
Posted by Ruth
