Dry weather and 
 
insufficient rainfall 
 
have led to severe water 
 
and food shortages 
 
across the nation, 
 
with worsening effects 
 
especially 
 
in central Somalia and 
 
areas bordering 
 
southeastern Ethiopia 
 
and northeastern Kenya. 
 
With at least 12,000 
 
who have been displaced, 
 
including men who have 
 
left their families 
 
in search of food, 
 
the United Nations 
 
estimates that some 
 
2.5 million are in need 
 
of nutritional aid. 
 
Five people have also 
 
been reported to have 
 
perished as a result of the 
 
prolonged dry conditions. 
 
Mark Bowden - Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator for Somalia, United Nations (M): 
 
Somalia looks as if 
 
it's going into another 
 
period of drought. 
 
The La Niña conditions 
 
that have been forecast 
 
in 2011 practically 
 
guarantee a hard dry 
 
season, which, again, 
 
given climate variability 
 
in Somalia may also be 
 
followed by flooding.
 
VOICE: 
 
In neighboring Kenya, 
 
more than 150,000 people 
 
have been declared 
 
vulnerable to starvation 
 
since crops failed 
 
and drought set in, 
 
while several children
 
in Ethiopia 
 
have been admitted 
 
to the hospital due to 
 
severe malnutrition. 
 
Meanwhile, locals 
 
have been skipping 
 
a meal a day and 
 
struggling to pay for 
 
trucked water or seeking 
 
unsafe drinking water 
 
in shallow wells. 
 
The situation in countries 
 
like Somalia is also often 
 
exacerbated because of 
 
certain regions where 
 
humanitarian aid 
 
organizations have been 
 
forbidden from operating.  
 
Mark Bowden (M): 
 
The difficulties that 
 
we do face are in terms 
 
of getting food assistance 
 
to all the population 
 
in Somalia. 
 
We're trying to address 
 
that in Somalia 
 
by putting a greater 
 
emphasis on meeting 
 
health, water and 
 
sanitation needs as well 
 
as provide support 
 
for the nutritional needs 
 
of children.
 
VOICE: 
 
We are grateful for the 
 
efforts of Mr. Bowden 
 
and the United Nations 
 
to respond 
 
to the desperate needs 
 
of the Somali people. 
 
Our prayers that 
 
with Heaven's grace 
 
and humanity's choice 
 
of balanced living, 
 
such extreme situations 
 
will be eased
 
for all beings on Earth. 
 
In an October 2009 
 
videoconference 
 
in Formosa (Taiwan), 
 
Supreme Master Ching Hai 
 
expressed 
 
her heartfelt concern 
 
for the drought-afflicted 
 
worldwide, urging 
 
for mitigating actions 
 
on everyone's part.
 
People are dying 
 
from droughts, people are 
 
leaving their villages, 
 
their hometowns 
 
because they don't have 
 
any more water to drink. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Some die on the road 
 
because of starvation; 
 
some die on the road 
 
looking for water. 
 
This is very, very tragic.
I hope we all wake up 
 
and wake up quick
 
to save our people, 
 
to save our home. 
 
Because many of 
 
our world co-citizens 
 
are not aware that many 
 
of our other co-citizens 
 
are dying because of 
 
lack of water, 
 
and lack of water 
 
means lack of food, 
 
lack of security. 
 
 
We must 
 
conserve the water; 
 
we must do everything 
 
we can. 
 
And the first step to begin 
 
is to be vegan. 
 
Because animal industry 
 
uses 70 more percent 
 
of the clean water 
 
of our planet!
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