Around 15 million people across East Africa are experiencing severe food and water shortages in the face of a crippling drought. Oxfam's Brendan Cox recently witnessed the grim reality during a visit to Wajir, in north-eastern Kenya.

Oxfam driver Abdul-Aziz Mehemed Mudey pours water into containers belonging to Yussuf Baryeye, one of the many people who wait at the edge of the road to stop passing vehicles and beg for water.
Photo: Jane Beesley/Oxfam.

Wajir is two hours from Nairobi by plane or two bone-crunching days by road.

It's one of the areas worst affected by the food crisis currently threatening 3.5 million Kenyans and I'm on my way to help with Oxfam's work in providing food and water to those who need it most.

Flying north-east of Nairobi, the land quickly loses any greenness it had. As we get closer to Wajir, the rivers run dry and the remaining trees look strangely autumnal given the sweltering heat. Despite flying low we can see almost no cattle, which is a bit like not seeing baguettes in France as they are normally so ubiquitous.

On the ground, I drive with Oxfam's team for three hours across the red sand leaving trails of dust behind us. The carcasses of dead cattle blot the landscape and pollute the air with their rotting flesh. Up to 70% of cattle here are already dead and in an area where cows equal currency, the cattle deaths spell destitution for their owners and their families. The drought is so bad that even camels - the world's best drought survivors - are succumbing. Almost 20,000 have died so far.

But it's not just animals that are finding it hard. As we drive along we are flagged down repeatedly by families who have run out of water and are increasingly desperate. My Oxfam colleagues stop each time and share the water they brought with them. One family of seven had just run out completely and in another case a father had been forced to give his children dirty, potentially deadly, water. His sense of relief as we filled his container with fresh water was palpable.

At the end of the three-hour drive we get to our destination and Oxfam's water trucking operation. The principle is the same as the ad hoc supplies we have just been involved in, but the scale is very different. These trucks run all day everyday, delivering 20,000 litres of water to 30 sites twice a week. Dozens of families gather from dawn at agreed spots where Oxfam's water teams line a pit with plastic before creating a pool that the families can then fill their water containers from.

The last time we supplied water to these families was four days ago and they can hardly wait to rehydrate themselves. Kids catch occasional drops of water that spill from the side of the truck. It's clear that people here are living right on the edge and the hardest months are still to come.

The next morning we made an early start for the livestock market in the centre of Wajir. Dozens of people had gathered early to haggle over their remaining livestock amid swirling dust. The livestock are so weak that the sellers know they won't make it back to their grazing areas alive; it's sell them or lose them, and as a result it's a buyers market. Prices have hit rock-bottom. You can now buy a cow for around 300 Kenyan shillings - that's about AUD $5.60.

Later in the day we stop by one of the few boreholes still drawing water - people come here from over 80km away in search of water. The scene around it is horrific. Carcass after carcass is strewn around the watering point - cattle, sheep and even camels.

I see one family leading their herd of sheep to the water hole. About 100 metres away in the baking heat, one of their sheep drops to its knees and, despite the best efforts of the family, refuses to get up. They have no choice but to leave it to die in the sun.

Now that so many animals have died, many families are dependent on aid. Oxfam is distributing food to 246,800 people in this district. I go to help at one of the distribution points in a town called Hungai - loosely translated as "disappointment" - where the monthly distribution of 10kg of cereal, 2kg of pulses and 600 grams of oil per person is underway.

The distribution is orderly and effective with a list of families in need, and children getting special supplements. However, with the United Nations appeal badly under-funded, only around half of those who need aid are being reached. That means the aid is shared between families and no one has enough.

Dead cattle by the Dambas bore hole in Wajir district, northern Kenya. Seventy per cent of cattle are already dead, with sheep, goats and even camels also dying due to lack of water and feed.
Photo: Mike Pflanz/Oxfam

More people are migrating to the town all the time. I speak to one family who has just arrived. They tell me they have lost all their cattle and have come here to find water for their camels. A local tells them there is none and after unloading their camels they set off again in search of water. Hungai is living up to its name.

The following day we met with our colleagues from Merlin, a medical charity helping malnourished children. They told me that the malnutrition rates are already triple their normal levels and that the huge numbers of kids currently classed as 'moderately' malnourished could, within weeks, move to being severely malnourished. It would be at this stage that the mortality rates would soar.

The local hospital is already full of severely malnourished children. In Wajir clinic alone, one child is already dying a week and that figure is increasing all the time.

The scenes on the ward are those that we all hoped Africa had left behind in the 1980s, distended bellies, children teetering on the brink of death and mothers waving flies away from their children's eyes. I try to imagine how I'd feel if my young nephews were in this situation, it's hard to contemplate how powerless you must feel not to be able to protect those who mean most to you.

Later, the local Oxfam team took me to a school where I met Mohammed the headmaster. He said that around a month ago, half of the primary school children had stopped attending classes. He explained that the drought was so severe that families had to take their cattle many miles away in search of pasture, making attending school impossible. Now however, school attendance is higher than it ever has been and the classrooms I saw were packed full of kids. My relief on at last hearing some good news was cut short when he explained that the only reason they have come back to school is because they no longer have any livestock to look after, and attending school is the only way they can get food.

On my last day, I went to the nerve centre of Oxfam's Wajir operation, in Wajir town. It's obvious how rapidly the town is changing. New families arrive all of the time, penniless and livestock-less and set up temporary shelters on the edge of town made out of sticks and bits of rubbish.

For all of them this has been a move of last resort. The soul-destroying months of seeing their only assets perish one at a time have taken their toll. Not only have they lost their assets; they have lost the only means of survival they knew. Those who can, now do odd jobs such as collecting firewood or delivering water to businesses for a handful of shillings.

I am lucky enough to be able to get on a plane and head back to the relative paradise of Nairobi, but these people have no such option. Nairobi seems a world away from Wajir.

As part of the Oxfam International response, we are working in Kenya, Ethiopia, Tanzania and Somalia, providing food and water and supporting vulnerable communities.

For more information about our emergency response in Africa, including how you can help, visit www.oxfam.org.au/world/emergencies/africafoodcrisis