Maputo — Mozambican Agriculture Minister Celso Correia has outraged opposition parties, and much of civil society, with a claim that 90 per cent of Mozambicans are eating three meals a day.

According to a report by the independent television station STV, Correia was speaking during a meeting on Wednesday in Rome with the Director-General of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), Qu Dongyu.

He said that 90 per cent of Mozambicans enjoy food security, "That is, they manage to eat three meals a day'.

There was thus no risk of famine in Mozambique. Less than ten per cent of the population is in a situation of food insecurity, Correia added.

"This is a great success of Mozambicans', said the Minister. "We are having these results and now our great challenge is to be certain that they are sustainable'.

Correia also stressed the need to improve Mozambicans' diet "and ensure more stability in access to foodstuffs. The work is not yet done, but we are on the right path'.

Correia gave no source for his figures. No survey on food security has been published recently, and so there is no way to corroborate the Minister's claim that the overwhelming majority of Mozambicans eat three meals a day.

It is, however, certainly true that Mozambique has come off the FAO's list of countries facing severe food insecurity. In October, the FAO Maputo representative, Hernani da Silva, clarified the FAO position, when he told the Zitamar News Service that what he meant was that nobody in Mozambique is in a situation of "catastrophe'.

That no famine is imminent is positive - but it is not the same as most people eating three meals a day.

Correia's claim is particularly startling in that it comes in the wake of severe flooding in southern Mozambique, leading to the loss of many thousands of hectares of crops, and thus compromising this year's harvest.