Niger, 'Food Crisis' by Marco Di Lauro

Photo Credit: Marco Di Lauro

Marco Di Lauro was born in Milan in 1970. He took his first photograph at the age of 14, during a vacation in Egypt. Thinking of becoming an art critic, he studied Italian literature and art history at the State University of Milan, and later enrolled in a journalism course at Boston University in Massachusetts.

Niger, Food Crisis

Contemporary Issues, first prize singles

June 27, 2010

Gadabedji, Niger Entrails and skeletons of dead livestock lie in the Gadabedji reserve in the Maradi region of Niger in western Africa. Meat traders buy up dying livestock, slaughter the animals, cook the meat on the spot and sell it to neighboring Nigeria. The worst drought in Niger since 1984 had left farmers herds starving and the Gadabedji reserve offered some of the last grazing land in the country. Together with a failed 2009 harvest, the drought led to a food crisis in Niger, with Maradi being one of the most severely hit regions. By mid-2010, a World Food Programme survey estimated that 2.5 million children in Niger were in need of emergency food aid. Lacking refrigeration facilities to store meat themselves, local cattle-farmers had little option but to sell their dying animals at a fraction of the usual rate and use the money to buy what food they could.

Photo credit:
Reportage by Getty Images