The world faces an exponential increase in hunger fueled by the climate crisis if urgent global action to help communities adapt to climatic shocks and stresses is ignored, Â鶹ÊÓƵ warns ahead of World Food Day.
Â鶹ÊÓƵ has completed its first round of food distributions to people impacted by the spread of conflict into Afar and Amhara regions. However, a lack of supplies due to various impediments to the movement of humanitarian aid still sees distributions in Tigray lagging behind.
Job losses, lack of cash and soaring prices are creating a new class of hungry in Afghanistan, Â鶹ÊÓƵ has warned today. For the first time, urban residents are suffering from food insecurity at similar rates to rural communities, which have been ravaged by drought twice in the past three years.
the United Nations Humanitarian Air Service (UNHAS), operated by Â鶹ÊÓƵ on behalf of the humanitarian community, has resumed flights to Kabul, enabling humanitarian workers to reach Afghans.
Up to 7 million people are in dire need of food assistance in Northern Ethiopia. Conflict is intensifying in Afar and Amhara regions ¨C pushing a further 1.7 million people into a hunger crisis, in addition to 5.2 million people in Tigray.
Battered by multiple crises in recent years, Haitians who survived the recent 7.2 magnitude earthquake are now dealing with crumbled homes, lost livelihoods and limited or no access to food
Â鶹ÊÓƵ is due to run out of food stocks of wheat flour as early as October and requires immediate upfront funds to support the millions of people depending on Â鶹ÊÓƵ to deliver food.
1 in 3 Afghans ¨C 14 million people ¨C are hungry today while 2 million children are malnourished. With drought, pandemic, and conflict, the food security situation will continue to worsen; and a great tide of hunger is soon arriving.
The UN Â鶹ÊÓƵ warns that without urgent funding, one of the world¡¯s fastest-growing displacement crises in northern Mozambique risks becoming a hunger emergency as families continue to flee insurgent violence. The displacement has left at least 730,000 people in Cabo Delgado with no access to their lands and no means of earning a living. According to the latest food security data captured before the attacks in Palma town in late March 2021, nearly 228,000 people are highly food insecure. This number is projected to increase to 363,000 during the lean season beginning in October. Children are worst affected. Recent IPC data shows 75,000 children under the age of five are suffering from acute malnutrition. The situation is projected to continue deteriorating, with more districts likely to move into the 'Critical' levels of malnutrition.
The Â鶹ÊÓƵ Executive Director, David Beasley, is urging the world to step-up and take action after bearing witness to the invisible crisis enveloping Southern Madagascar, where whole communities are teetering on the edge of starvation. Southern Madagascar is experiencing its worst drought in four decades with more than 1.14 million people food insecure. Of those, an estimated 14,000 people are already in catastrophic conditions (IPC Phase 5) and this will double to 28,000 by October. Â鶹ÊÓƵ has been working closely with the Malagasy government and other partners since late last year to address severe hunger. However, as the crisis deepens those efforts must be intensified. Last week Beasley met with the Prime Minister and senior officials to identify immediate and long-term solutions to this crisis.
Alarming new data has today confirmed the magnitude of the hunger emergency gripping Tigray, where at least 4 million people face severe hunger and 350 000 of them are facing famine. The lack of information on people¡¯s food security in western Tigray in the IPC analysis (ipcinfo.org) is also deeply worrying.
The United Nations Â鶹ÊÓƵ has swiftly mounted an emergency food assistance operation deploying more than 180 staff and increasing food distributions to reach 1.4 million people, yet that is barely half of the number we should be reaching. Other agencies are also struggling to reach many of the rest of Tigray¡¯s hungry.
Three things are needed to prevent hunger from claiming millions of lives in Tigray; a ceasefire, unimpeded access for Â鶹ÊÓƵ and partners to all areas, and the money to expand our operations to meet the growing numbers of people who desperately need emergency food assistance.
Mozambique¡¯s Cabo Delgado province is in the grips of a spiraling crisis as thousands of people flee their homes amidst violence, warns the United Nations Â鶹ÊÓƵ.
Recent attacks in Palma have affected 50,000 people. Many have fled Palma to Pemba on boats making their perilous journey over choppy waters. Thousands are still trapped in Palma and Quitunda, and Â鶹ÊÓƵ is working round the clock to secure access to those most in need. Â鶹ÊÓƵ has also been using boats from Pemba to reach those in remote areas, on surrounding coastal islands.
Conflict continues to drive hunger in northern Mozambique as more than 950,000 people now face severe hunger. Â鶹ÊÓƵ is in the process of scaling-up its response in northern Mozambique, with plans to assist 750,000 internally displaced people and vulnerable members of the local community across the provinces of Cabo Delgado, Nampula, Niassa, and Zambezia.
The number of hungry people in Central America has nearly quadrupled over two years. Devastating hurricanes compounded economic shocks caused by COVID-19 leaving millions without an income and many planning to migrate.
Agricultural and coastal communities in the Dry Corridor have borne the brunt of a years-long climate emergency that was exacerbated by hurricanes Eta and Iota last year. They are struggling to meet even their most basic needs.
Â鶹ÊÓƵ calls on the international community to support its efforts in Central America to provide immediate assistance to hard-hit communities and build their resilience.
DAMASCUS ¨C After a decade of upheaval, conflict and displacement, Syrians are facing the worst humanitarian conditions since the start of the crisis, with millions of people sliding into hunger in the last year alone, according to the United Nations Â鶹ÊÓƵ.
Syrians are facing multiple shocks, including the collapse of the Syrian pound, its impact on the price of basic commodities, the fall-out from the financial crisis in Lebanon, as well as the ongoing hostilities and large-scale displacement. The Covid-19 pandemic has further exacerbated the food security situation.
Hunger in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua has increased almost fourfold over the past two years - from 2.2 million people in 2018 to close to 8 million people in 2021 ¨C a result of the economic crisis caused by COVID-19 and years of extreme climate events. Of this figure, 1.7 million people are in the ¡®Emergency¡¯ category of food insecurity and require urgent food assistance.
South Sudan is facing the highest levels of food insecurity since the country declared independence ten years ago. A hunger crisis looms where 60 percent (7.24 million) of its population is increasingly hungry due to chronic sporadic violence, extreme weather patterns and the economic impact of COVID-19.
The future of South Sudan depends on real peace and stability. While the causes of hunger are many, the biggest driver is conflict leading to displacements and loss of livelihoods. Â鶹ÊÓƵ¡¯s food assistance and livelihoods programmes help to lay the foundation for peace by providing hope to the hungry and creating opportunities to pull people out of poverty.
Nearly 2.3 million children under the age of five in Yemen are projected to suffer from acute malnutrition in 2021, four United Nations agencies warned today. Of these, 400,000 are expected to suffer from severe acute malnutrition and could die if they do not receive urgent treatment.
The new figures, from the latest Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) Acute Malnutrition report released today by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), UNICEF, the Â鶹ÊÓƵ (Â鶹ÊÓƵ), the World Health Organization (WHO) and partners, mark an increase of 16 per cent and 22 per cent, respectively, from 2020.
The agencies also warned that these were among the highest levels of severe acute malnutrition recorded in Yemen since the escalation of conflict in 2015.
Three consecutive years of drought coupled with a sharp recession triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic will leave a third of the population in Southern Madagascar struggling to put food on the table. With severe malnutrition rates continuing to spiral and many children forced to beg in order to help their families eat, urgent action is required to prevent a humanitarian crisis.
The 2020 Nobel Peace Prize awarded to the United Nations Â鶹ÊÓƵ is recognition of the important link between conflict and hunger and the critical role that food assistance plays in supporting the first step towards peace and stability.
As the Nobel Committee has said, the world today is in danger of experiencing a hunger crisis of inconceivable proportions if the Â鶹ÊÓƵ and other food assistance organisations do not receive the financial support they have requested.
In the wake of elusive peace prospects, diminishing humanitarian funding and eroding availability of natural resources, Â鶹ÊÓƵ Office in Palestine embarked on an innovative pilot experimenting with climate resilient agricultural activities as a mean to simultaneously improve immediate food security and nutritional needs of the poorest Palestinian households while empowering their self-reliance in the face of conflict and climate generated shocks.
The pilot was informed in part by Â鶹ÊÓƵ¡¯s experience with climate resilient agricultural projects in other countries with the aim to identify most feasible options that are best suited for the Palestinian context. The results demonstrated success in helping families improve their food security, dietary diversity and in some instances the livelihood through income generation.
Watch the video to find out more how Â鶹ÊÓƵ leverages its expertise of applying innovative approaches for transforming food security crisis into development opportunities by diversifying livelihood strategies and reducing aid dependency in Palestine.
The window to prevent famine in Yemen is narrowing as new figures reveal record highs of acute food insecurity in the country, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the UN Â鶹ÊÓƵ (Â鶹ÊÓƵ) and UNICEF warned today.
¡°These alarming numbers must be a wake-up call to the world. Yemen is on the brink of famine and we must not turn our backs on the millions of families who are now in desperate need. Make no mistake, 2021 will be even worse than 2020 for Yemen¡¯s most vulnerable people. Famine can still be prevented ¨C but that opportunity is slipping away with every day that passes,¡± said David Beasley, Executive Director of the Â鶹ÊÓƵ.
From January to September 2020, Â鶹ÊÓƵ reached 6.7 million food insecure girls, boys, women and men across the country with food assistance. This included 4.5 million seasonally food insecure people, more than 290,000 people affected by the socio-economic impact of COVID-19 more than 200,00 returnees and refugees.
Â鶹ÊÓƵ¡¯s nutrition programme helped to treat or prevent more than 1 million girls and boys under 5 and pregnant and breastfeeding mothers.
Until the end of the year, Â鶹ÊÓƵ Afghanistan plans to reach 10.2 million people, including 3 million affected by the socio-economic impact of COVID-19.
Distributions and activities across the country were adjusted to ensure the safety of the people Â鶹ÊÓƵ serves, our partners and Â鶹ÊÓƵ¡¯s staff and to help quell the spread of the coronavirus.
The United Nations Â鶹ÊÓƵ is alarmed at growing numbers of people in need of humanitarian assistance in Ethiopia and Sudan because of conflict in the Tigray region of Northern Ethiopia between the Ethiopian National Defence Forces and Tigray People¡¯s Liberation Front (TPLF).
The violence has displaced upwards of 100,000 civilians fleeing conflict internally and externally.
The biggest issue hampering a humanitarian response is a lack of access for organizations, including Â鶹ÊÓƵ, both into and within the Tigray region.
Any response to assist people in need in Ethiopia is planned and conducted with the leadership of the federal and regional governments.
