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In this age of the green revolution, with crop yields skyrocketing, drought no longer automatically means famine. India, for example, is now in the midst of its worst drought in decades, but because it has a food surplus and a relatively organized system for feeding the hungry, few are expected to starve. Usually it is the combination of drought, mismanagement and civil war that brings famine. Ethiopia is afflicted with all three.
Getting the food to the hungry is made more difficult by inadequate port facilities, poor or nonexistent roads and insufficient planes and trucks to transport food to rural areas. But the biggest block in the pipeline is civil strife. The government is battling 23 rebel groups and factions in every part of the country. The two strongest insurgent armies are in Tigre and Eritrea, the provinces hit hardest by the drought. Eritrea has been in rebellion against the government ever since it was annexed by Ethiopia in 1962, and a guerrilla movement began building in Tigre in 1977.
During the last famine the rebels and international agencies had a policy of live and let live. But in late October, Eritrean People's Liberation Front guerrillas attacked an unguarded convoy of 23 trucks on its way from Asmara, capital of Eritrea, to Mekele, capital of Tigre. One driver was killed, and the trucks -- loaded with 674 tons of food, enough to feed 30,000 people for a month -- were destroyed by grenades. The E.P.L.F. claimed that some of the trucks contained military equipment, a charge that U.N. officials deny. Since then, the E.P.L.F. has attacked two Ethiopian military-civilian convoys that reportedly included food trucks.
The rebel sabotage brought the entire operation for Tigre and Eritrea to a halt for more than a month. Not only were the convoys under threat from Eritrean and Tigrean rebels, but even those agencies willing to risk assault could not move their trucks because the government closed the roads. "If many people die this year and next, it will not be due to drought but the politico- military situation," said one relief worker.
Convoys are moving again during daylight hours in Eritrea, with agency staffers driving the perilous roads at their own risk. But much of Tigre remains cut off; the Tigrean People's Liberation Front has demanded that the Mengistu government rescind its resettlement policy before it guarantees the safety of the food trucks.