LATE RAINS SPARK INFLATION RISKS, PRAYER CALL IN SOUTHERN AFRICAJOHANNESBURG – Poor rainfall over vast tracts of southern Africa has delayed crop plantings and prompted a presidential call for prayer, with drought conditions threatening the 2022 harvest and stoking risks of higher food inflation.Precipitation through mid-December has been significantly below average across Madagascar, Malawi, central and northern Mozambique, and northwestern Zimbabwe, according to the Famine Early Warning Systems Network, a U.S. government-backed organisation that tracks food insecurity.Farmers in Zambia have also been hit. Malawian President Lazarus Chakwera has called for a week of prayers for rain.“Across these areas, drought conditions are ongoing to start the season,” Fews Net said in a statement on its website Friday. “Land preparation activities are delayed, and planting has yet to begin across many areas as of November.”The planting season normally starts in November for much of the region, with harvesting complete around April.Malawi, Zimbabwe and Zambia already have double-digit […]
LATE RAINS SPARK INFLATION RISKS, PRAYER CALL IN SOUTHERN AFRICA
