|Written by Charles Mpaka| |Monday, 11 January 2010| For a
country whose lifeblood is agriculture, the cost of droughts and
floods does not end with the wilting or washing away of crops.
It also hits the national economy. CHARLES MPAKA writes As
Frackson Saidi accounts for his desperation now that his maize
has wilted under the Neno dry spell, communities that are
receiving good rains and have a promising crop may not think
that the effects of that drought will reach them. Saidi, 61,
told Malawi News last week he had never seen such a drought in
Neno since. To underline the tragic scale of the problem, he
said the crop was beyond redemption. “Even if the rains were to
come, the crop is unlikely to survive. Government must assist us
[with fertilisers and seeds] to replant. Otherwise, it will be
forced to provide us with relief food next year,” he said. This
is more than an individual problem. UNDP indicates in its 2008
Human Development Report that effects of these natural disasters
spiral beyond the fields an