The emergency in Mali has different characteristics than in Niger. There are no camps or large scale food programmes that one sees in the media where thousands of women queue for rations. However, one of the ways in which it is manifested is in child labour. Thousands of children have dropped out of school to go find work to help support the family.

During the food crisis, nearly 400,000 children in Niger are at risk of severe acute malnutrition because they have not had sufficient food to eat or a balanced diet. At the Tillaberi CRENI (hospital for children) built by Plan and managed by the government, I've met infants severely malnourished and tottering on the brink of death.

The Tuaregs here told me horror stories of pillage and plunder of their livestock, food, homes, clothes and their women - some had been raped and assaulted. Other women were taken from their homes never to be seen again. Other loved ones were missing and presumed dead...