text: Niger was a "stray after-thought, carved out of the remnants of French West Africa when the region won freedom from France exactly 45 years ago,' said Loyn. And in 1973 it suffered the peak of its worst famine. A three-year famine devastated the country causing widespread starvation and thousands of deaths. As in most famines, political mismanagement contributed more to death than the weather. With drought in 2004 and low rainfall in 2005 Loyn draws parallels with that great famine and implies that climate change is contributing.