[6] Furthermore, these natural disasters caused extensive damage to local infrastructure systems, and hampered access to essential sources of food, water, education and healthcare.

[10] The US Agency for International Development's (USAID's) Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWSNET) reported that the greater horn of Africa region received up to 300 per cent above average rainfall from October to mid-November 2019.

[8] East Africa currently experiences unseasonably heavy rains caused by the higher-than-average temperatures of the Indian Ocean, potentially due to cyclical dipole weather phenomena and global warming.

[14] The recently launched Global Humanitarian Overview (GHO) indicated that natural disasters posed substantial risks to the approximately 80 per cent of Burundians dependent on subsistence farming, and that 1.74 million people would need aid in 2020.

[15][non-primary source needed][8] An anonymous local Cibitoke provincial government official, reported to Reuters that victims were living on a hillside which gave way after the heavy rains of the day before.

The international community's willingness to help the affected people was communicated in a December 6 meeting with the Government's Provincial Platform, led by the Governor's Counsellor in charge of social affairs.

The Government of Burundi's Civil Protection and Disaster Management Unit, the public provincial and communal administration, the BRCS, the police, the army, the surrounding population, and the Cibitoke and Mugina Health Districts [7][non-primary source needed] all deployed local emergency relief services.

[5] The UNOCHA intersectoral team concluded that the most pressing necessities in order of priority were food and water, shelter and other non-food items (NFIs such as household, WASH, female dignity and school kits as well as monetary funds for such were provided by IOM, World Vision, BRCS, UNICEF, UNFPA, the USAID OFDA, Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance, and NGOs Help a Child,[20] War Child Holland, Concern Worldwide & We World-GVC Archived August 5, 2020, at the Wayback Machine),[6][5] psychosocial support, and access between hills and villages.

Landslides washed away fields that were exploited by these populations, as well as their crops and food reserves, notably those by the Mubarazi river in Muramvya,[21][non-primary source needed] and similarly much livestock.

No provisions were made yet for people with special needs, and a relocation site identified in the village of Rusagara, not far from the shopping centre of the municipality of Mugina, was rejected for the second time by the BRCS.

"[8] A week after the landslide, the burial of the recovered bodies, arranged by the BRCS in cooperation with the various Partner National Societies (PNS) of the ICRC (Finnish Red Cross, Belgian Red Cross and East Africa Country Cluster Support Team),[5] took place on December 12 in the Nyamakarabo area, but issues were still faced in the lack of assistance to the efforts of the authorities in conducting SAR operations, the extraction of corpses, and the evacuation of the wounded to nearby hospitals.

[24] The UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) have both stated that the phenomenally heavy rains have contributed to a "serious and widespread desert locust outbreak".