Mozambique closure report

On the evening of Thursday 14 March, Category 3 Tropical Cyclone Idai made landfall in Beira, Mozambique’s fourth largest city, bringing high wind speeds of up to 224 km per hour and heavy rains. The cyclone followed extensive flooding throughout the Mozambique provinces of Sofala, Zambézia, and Manica Provinces in early March, causing significant infrastructure damage and interrupting regular supply routes.

On 25 April, Mozambique was hit by a second cyclone. Category 4 Tropical Cyclone Kenneth made land fall in Cabo Delgado province, bringing wind speeds of up to 200 km per hour and heavy rains. The cyclone left a trail of destruction in the districts of Quissanga, Macomia and Ibo. On Ibo and Matemo islands, 90% of infrastructure was reported to be severely compromised.

Both cyclones caused significant damage to the logistics infrastructure across the affected areas including warehouses, roads and bridges. According to OCHA, Cyclone Idai left 1.85 million people in need, and Cyclone Kenneth an additional 374,000, resulting in over 2.2 million people affected, of which around 2 million were targeted for assistance.

On 20 March, the Logistics Cluster was activated. The World Food Programme (WFP), as lead agency of the Logistics Cluster, was requested to support the government-led response, and provide coordination and information management support, as well as facilitating access to common logistics services to assist the humanitarian community in their efforts to deliver life-saving items across affected areas. WFP as cluster Lead Agency acted as ‘provider of last resort’, offering common logistics services to fill identified common logistics gaps in the humanitarian supply chain and supplement the response of the humanitarian community through the provision of common logistics services. Overall, the cluster supported 102 humanitarian organisations throughout the humanitarian response.

As the situation improved and national structures had the capacity to meet humanitarian needs, the Logistics Cluster transferred the core cluster functions to the national NDMO and began to phase out facilitation of common logistics services. In its exit strategy, the Logistics Cluster included a transition phase until formal de-activated of the cluster, which comprised the provision of technical support in logistics preparedness to the NDMO. The rollout of preparedness initiatives following the Cyclone Idai and Cyclone Kenneth operation, solidifies the cluster’s commitment to strengthening global-regional-local networks, capacities and collaboration, before, during and after emergencies.