This map of the most recent growing season in East Africa reveals the poor conditions that led to famine in parts of Somalia and a food emergency in Somalia, Ethiopia, Kenya, and Djibouti.
In 2005, much of eastern Africa suffered severe drought. Crops and natural vegetation, including grazing land for livestock, withered. Livestock deaths and human food shortages were widespread.
Severe drought choked East Africa, particularly Kenya, though much of 2009. This image shows the cumulative effect of the drought on vegetation just as the drought-breaking rains began to fall in October.