On Monday, the United Nations called for urgent humanitarian actions in 20 countries considered a “hunger hotspots” in the world, including five Arab countries, which are Syria, Sudan, Yemen, Somalia and Lebanon.
A joint report issued by the World Food Program (WFP) and Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) warned of worsening food insecurity from June to September 2022.
The report indicated that 750,000 people already facing starvation and death in Ethiopia, Yemen, South Sudan, Somalia and Afghanistan.
“Ethiopia, Nigeria, South Sudan, and Yemen remain at ‘highest alert’ as hotspots with catastrophic conditions, and Afghanistan and Somalia are new entries to this worrisome class since the previous hotspots report in January 2022. These countries all have segments of the population facing IPC phase 5 ‘Catastrophe’ – or at risk of deterioration towards catastrophic conditions.”
The report added that The Democratic Republic of the Congo, Haiti, the Sahel region, the Sudan, and Syria remain ‘countries of very high concern’ with deteriorating critical conditions.
It stressed that the conflict in Ukraine is compounding what is already a year of catastrophic hunger, unleashing a wave of collateral hunger that is spreading across the globe, transforming a series of terrible hunger crises into a global food crisis the world cannot afford.
The report also pointed out that Lebanon, Sri Lanka, West African coastal countries (Benin, Cabo Verde, and Guinea), Ukraine and Zimbabwe have been added to the list of hotspots countries, joining Angola, Madagascar, and Mozambique which continue to be hunger hotspots.
The report finds that – alongside conflict – climate shocks will continue to drive acute hunger in the outlook period from June to September 2022 and we have entered a ‘new normal’ where frequent and recurring droughts, flooding, hurricanes and cyclones decimate farming, drive displacement and push millions to the brink in countries across the world.
