Image
© NasaTropical Cyclone Bingiza made landfall on Madagascar on February 14, 2011
Tropical cyclone Bingiza could lead to further flooding in Madagascar and Mozambique where heavy rains have left soils saturated and people without homes, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

Between 4,000 and 9,600 households, equivalent to as many as 48,000 people, are likely to be affected by flooding in the Zambezi river valley in Mozambique, OCHA, as the organization is known, said in an e-mailed statement today.

Flooding in southern Africa has affected South Africa, Mozambique, Madagascar, Zimbabwe, Namibia and Angola during the last eight weeks. Crop damage in South Africa, the continent's largest economy, could cost the nation more than $282 million after grape farms were submerged, while OCHA estimates that almost 1 percent of Mozambique's crops have been destroyed by rising water.

Floods in Lesotho, a mountainous, land-locked country surrounded by South Africa, lost at least 672 homes and more than 4,700 livestock to floods that led to outbreaks of diarrhea and dysentery in both humans and animal herds, OCHA said.

In Angola, floods have displaced 34,380 people and killed 22, the UN organization said. "Those made homeless have been placed at shelter camps, staying in tents provided by the government," it said.