![Farmers harvest teff in a roadside field between Axum and Adwa in Tigray, October 2007 (A. Davey, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0) [file photo]](https://i0.wp.com/mereja.com/index/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/economy-teff-harvest-axum-adwa-2007-20261007095204-55ad.jpg?resize=780%2C505&ssl=1)
Farmers harvest teff in a roadside field between Axum and Adwa in Tigray, October 2007 (A. Davey, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0) [file photo]
Ethiopia’s main harvest is in danger after one of the driest kiremt rainy seasons on record, and early warning experts say crops are likely to fail in parts of the northeast. Food prices are likely to rise in the coming months, while the war in Tigray, Amhara and Afar has cut off much of the aid on which hungry families in the north depend.
The June to September rains were among the driest ever recorded, the Addis Ababa business publication Birr Metrics reported on Wednesday, and harvests are expected to be below average in parts of Tigray, Amhara, Afar and Oromia, with water shortages already reported in the northeast. The publication said the October to December rains may be wetter but are unlikely to make up for the crops that have already been lost, so families and traders should expect more pressure on food prices.
FEWS NET’s September outlook for Ethiopia describes the kiremt season as historically poor, with “rainfall deficits exceeding 50 percent of average rainfall across much of the country” and “exceptional drought conditions across nearly all kiremt-receiving areas.” That is serious because the meher harvest, which is gathered after the kiremt rains, “accounts for over 85 percent of national crop production,” according to FEWS NET. In the northeast, including areas along the Tekeze River and in eastern Tigray, some farmers had to plant their fields twice, and the network warned that “crop failure is likely as maize is wilted and sorghum is severely stunted.” It expects the same in the lowlands of East and West Hararghe, and it said pasture in Afar is “extremely poor and sparsely available,” which threatens the herds that pastoralists live on. FEWS NET expects Crisis (IPC Phase 3) levels of food insecurity to continue in affected areas through January 2027, with some households likely to fall into Emergency (IPC Phase 4). At the same time, it expects a strengthening El Niño to bring above-average rains and likely flooding to the south and southeast later in the year.
One returnee told DW Amharic that after months of conflict, hunger is now more frightening than the fighting. In the Wag Hemra zone of Amhara, displaced families from the Abergele and Tsagbji districts have started to go back after government security forces regained control of the area from an armed group that had held it since April, DW Amharic reported on Monday. More than 56,000 people from five districts had sheltered in the town of Sekota. “There is no harvest. The crop is very dry. There is no rain in Abergele,” one returnee told DW Amharic, adding that now it is hunger, more than the war, that frightens them. Another resident, Wodaje Belay, said the 65-kilometer trip from Sekota to Abergele costs as much as 1,000 birr, so many people walk. DW Amharic also reported that more than 60,000 long-term displaced people in North and South Wollo face food shortages because aid groups have closed their projects, and that zone and district officials did not answer its calls.
Aid agencies say they cannot reach many of the people in need. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said on Wednesday that fighting continues to displace people across Central, North-Western and Eastern Tigray, although verified figures are not available, and that the UN and its partners are ready to resume aid operations in the north, including Tigray, “as and when they gain access.” In Amhara, a government-led effort to take people displaced by recent insecurity from the town of Kobo back to their home areas was suspended after the security situation got worse, OCHA said, adding that any returns must be “safe, voluntary, informed and dignified.” Tom Fletcher (@UNReliefChief), the UN’s emergency relief coordinator, wrote on X on Monday that “our teams are working to get life-saving food, health and other help to people in need,” that “fighting continues to harm and displace civilians, drive up needs and disrupt our work,” and that “all parties must give aid workers safe and rapid access.”
Farhan Haq, the UN deputy spokesperson, said the stocks looted from UN warehouses in Tigray included food, seeds, fertilizer and water pumps, DW Amharic reported, and he said the UN was preparing to resume food and health assistance in Tigray and Afar. The opposition party Salsay Weyane Tigray warned on Tuesday that people in Tigray face the danger of famine and called on the international community to make sure that humanitarian aid reaches them urgently and without obstacles, according to DW Amharic.
In its Africa Economic Update released on Tuesday, the World Bank said that “Ethiopia faces risks from unresolved insecurity in Amhara and Oromia, alongside rising tensions with Eritrea,” The Reporter Magazine reported, and it also pointed to the danger that Houthi attacks pose to Red Sea shipping and to remittances from workers in the Gulf. The bank described Ethiopia as the “most consequential active case” under the G20 Common Framework for debt treatment and said an exchange of its Eurobond was expected by the end of the year. Across Sub-Saharan Africa, the bank expects growth of 4.3 percent in 2026. The government has not yet announced its own estimate of this year’s meher harvest.
“We have never seen a drought like this. There is no rain. We are in a very difficult year,” Alem Misgina, a farmer in Alitena in the Eastern Zone of Tigray, told BBC Amharic in early September. An X user who signs as Dr. Tajure Nemu (@NemuTajure) argued on Wednesday that Ethiopia “should not be distracted by the latest alignment of Egypt, Eritrea, Somalia and Sudan,” pointing to a projected growth rate of 9.2 percent for Ethiopia compared with 4.2 percent for Egypt, 2.6 percent for Somalia and 0.7 percent for Sudan. The World Bank forecasts 7.8 percent growth for the current fiscal year.
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