Erratic rainfall is affecting the ability of Mozambique farmers to grow their crops. The strange pattern of drought followed by excessive rains and flooding prevents crops from being able to grow. and therefore, the people of Mozambique are struggling to eat.

The continent of Africa has the lightest carbon footprint, but it is going to pay the heaviest price for human-induced climate change.

As Earth Day was yesterday, we are taking a closer look at how climate change is affecting this small African nation.

Canadian charity CARE works in Mozambique to help farmers deal with the issue of climate change. Angie Daze, the Regional Climate Change Coordinator for Southern and West Africa, says that the message they need to send to the people is that "we need to incorporate climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction  into development work in order for it to be effective and sustainable."

Michelle Carter, the Assistant Program Director in Mozambique, says that it is "one of the world's poorest countries, where most people live on less that a US dollar a day." In the 1990s, Mozambique was considered the poorest country in the world.

Times have changed since then, but with the way that climate change is changing the landscape of the country, it appears that they could reclaim this title once again.

CARE has been working in Mozambique since 1986, and Ms. Carter explains that currently "CARE has four major rural development projects in Nampula and Cabo Delgado, covering 19 districts, 14 in Nampula and three in Cabo Delgado, that seek to improve technical knowledge and practice crop production, high yeilding seeds, and improve access to markets and strengthen means for irrigation."

However, the erractic rains is affecting the charity's ability to help the farmers, and to build a sustainable society. It could be a massive threat to human development.

Ms. Carter says "it’s the farmers themselves which say the rains are different, [so] it’s harder to predict.  For CARE, this has meant strategies focused on diversification of livelihoods including savings and credits and other non-agricultural based programming – or at the very least more drought resistant varieties."

This climate change could reduce the length of growing season and could halt agriculture completely in some regions.

It is still to be determined how much climate change will affect the small African nation of Mozambique, but it is definitely causing an impact and no one is arguing with that.

This article could not have been written without the help of Angie Daze, Michelle Carter and CARE.

The picture is also provided by Angie Daze and CARE.

Soaring global food prices are negatively impacting Mozambique, especially the poor who already struggle to survive. Extraordinarily high food prices in domestic markets are exacerbating the living conditions of millions of Mozambicans who are plagued by recurrent natural disasters and debilitating poverty – 54 percent of the population lives below the poverty line, 63 percent of rural children live in absolute poverty and 34 percent of households nationwide are food insecure and face perpetual hunger.

There are a number of factors fueling the global high food price crisis, which has wreaked havoc throughout the world in 2008. These include increased demand due to the economic rise of developing countries with large populations and due to the use of food crops in bio-fuel production, as well as high energy costs, prolonged drought in key producing countries, declining global grain stocks, and speculation in international commodity markets.

In Mozambique, high food and fuel prices may jeopardize national development gains of the past few years and may threaten food security and social stability.

© Mário Macilau

The high price phenomenon is already taking its toll. According to the Government-led Vulnerability Assessment Committee (VAC) Food Security and Nutrition Assessment, conducted in October 2008, many households are resorting to extreme coping mechanisms in an effort to survive – including reducing both quality and quantity of food consumed and the number of meals eaten each day. Coping strategies also include the forced selling of productive assets, exchanging casual labor for food and removing children from school. These households have little or no capacity for recovery without external assistance.