Remote mid-western districts of Humla, Jumla, Kalikot, Mugu and Dolpa are facting acute food shortage due to lack of rain over the last six months. Farmers across the region couldn’t plant their barley, wheat and maize and where they did, the plants dried away due to the drought.

“Most of the people have run out of their food stocks and running to the district headquarters with hopes to see the arrival of food from Nepalgunj,” former chairman of District Development Committee of Humla, Jivan Bahadur Shahi, told Nepalnews.

“The people in Karnali were not able to distinguish which of the crops can be taken as food,” says Shahi, adding, “They do not regard wheat, barely, potato or maize as food.” The major reason, he claims, for this growing tradition was their psychology to regard that those taking rice have high social prestige.

Min Bahadur Shahi, president of Karnali Integrated Rural Development and Resource Center (KIRTARC), said the government must focus on changing the food habits of the local people rather than seeking funds to supply food from Kathmandu every year.

But this will take years while the issue at hand is to send food for hungry and malnourished people immediately. According to the state-run Nepal Food Corporation (NFC), out of 40,470 quintals (including additional supply of 8,250 quintals) of food allocated for Karnali region this year, nearly 85 percent has already reached the district headquarters. But people continue to go hungry for the past several weeks.

According to Min Bahadur Shahi, most of the supplied stuff is consumed at the district headquarters by the government officials and security personnel. “Since there hasn’t been separate supplies for security personnel this year, they have consumed most of the food meant for villagers,” he added.

Indications of crisis was felt as early as in March this year when a French INGO, Action Contre La Faim (ACF), carried out food and nutrition survey in these districts. The INGO said the problem was serious in southern Humla, northern Kalikot, and the southern belt of Mugu and Dolpa districts. The decision of the royal government to stop the supply of rice fearing to be looted by Maoists added fuel to the deepening crisis.

While people in villages pass hungry days, relatives of government officials in district headquarters have started establishing local alcohol shops, which are made out of the food supplied from Kathmandu, according to reports.

Deputy General Manager of the NFC, P. C Pandey, said his office was not in a position to maintain additional supply. “We have asked Ministry of Supplies for additional support but could not receive any reply. We have been facing problem in transporting remaining food from Nepalgunj by air to these districts due to bad weather,” he said. Supply by mules is not possible in the summer.

The problem of food crisis in Karnali has been headache for the government for the last three-and-half decades. It has encouraged people to rely more on government supplies than seeking alternatives for growing food locally. “Though the region has less than one percent land for cultivation of rice, seasonal cereals and grains, cash crops can be gown abundantly,” said former DDC president Shahi.

Some relief organisations say the situation has turned so serious that sending rice to the region will not be enough, food now will have to be dropped from helicopters directly into affected VDCs.