Swaziland: Diets downsized by financial crisis

According to a report by the UN Country Team in Swaziland, released on 16 March, a fiscal crisis which started early in 2011 has put an additional strain on poor households like Thwala’s and worsened poverty in a country which already had high rates of unemployment and food insecurity and the highest HIV rate in the world. The report, based on a November 2011 survey of 1,334 households, found that poor households have had to adopt extreme measures to cope with reduced incomes resulting from job losses and wage cuts, as well as higher food and fuel prices and reduced access to social services.