Livestock prices across markets in Mudug region have dramatically declined largely due to the drought intensifying in rural areas. Herders and traders say there is no pasture nor water for the animals, which are all extremely thin.
“We used to sell a goat for two million Somali shillings before, but the price has been going down since the drought began,” Abdi Isse Sahal, a livestock trader told Radio Ergo’s local reporter in the largest livestock market in Galkayo. “We now hardly sell a goat for one million shillings.”
As many pastoralist families are desperate for money to survive during this time of drought, they have being trying to sell off some of their animals. The number of livestock brought to the market for sale has more than doubled. However, only about a third of the animals on sale in the market find a buyer, Sahal said.
He estimated that at least 300 head of livestock were sold every day in the town’s livestock market prior to the drought, but at the moment fewer than 100 are being bought on a good day.
