Tag Archives: United Nations’ World Food Program (WFP)

U.N. agency says 41 million on verge of famine

By Maytaal Angel

LONDON (Reuters) – Some 41 million people worldwide are at at imminent risk of famine, the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) warned on Tuesday, saying soaring prices for basic foods were compounding existing pressures on food security.

Another half a million are already experiencing famine-like conditions, said the WFP’s Executive Director David Beasley.

“We now have four countries where famine-like conditions are present. Meanwhile 41 million people are literally knocking on famine’s door,” he said.

The WFP, which is funded entirely by voluntary donations, said it needs to raise $6 billion immediately to reach those at risk, in 43 countries.

“We need funding and we need it now,” said Beasley.

After declining for several decades, world hunger has been on the rise since 2016, driven by conflict and climate change.

In 2019, 27 million people were on the brink of famine, according to the WFP, but since 2020 the COVID-19 pandemic has been added to the mix.

World food prices rose in May to their highest levels in a decade, U.N. figures show, with basics like cereals, oilseeds, dairy products, meat and sugar up a combined 40% versus year ago levels.

Currency depreciation in countries like Lebanon, Nigeria, Sudan, Venezuela and Zimbabwe is adding to these pressures and driving prices even higher, stoking food insecurity.

Famine-like conditions are present this year in Ethiopia, Madagascar, South Sudan and Yemen, as well as in pockets of Nigeria and Burkina Faso.

But Beasley warned against “debating numbers to death” as happened in Somalia in 2011 when 130,000 people – half the eventual toll from starvation – had already died by the time famine was declared.

The WFP, which was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize last year, says around 9 percent of the world’s population, equivalent to nearly 690 million people, go to bed hungry each night.

(Reporting by Maytaal Angel; editing by John Stonestreet)

Famine looms in southern Madagascar, U.N.’s food agency says

Salem Abdullah Musabih, 6, lies on a bed at a malnutrition intensive care unit at a hospital in the Red Sea port city of Hodaida, Yemen

By Stephanie Nebehay

GENEVA (Reuters) – Famine threatens southern Madagascar after drought and sandstorms ruined harvests, reducing people to eating locusts and leaves, the United Nations’ World Food Program (WFP) said on Friday.

The lives of children are in danger, especially those under five years old whose malnutrition rates have reached “alarming levels”, Amer Daoudi, senior director of global WFP operations, said by video link from Madagascar’s capital Antananarivo.

At least 1.35 million people are in need of food assistance in the region, but the WFP is only reaching 750,000 with “half-rations” due to financial constraints, he said.

“Famine looms in southern Madagascar as communities witness an almost total disappearance of food sources which has created a full-blown nutrition emergency,” Daoudi told a U.N. briefing in Geneva.

He said he had visited villages where “people have had to resort to desperate survival measures, such as eating locusts, raw red cactus fruits or wild leaves”.

The harvest was expected to be nearly 40% below the 5-year average, he added.

Malnutrition among children under 5 has almost doubled to 16% from 9% in the four months to March 2021 following five consecutive years of drought, exacerbated this year by sandstorms and late rains, he said.

A rate of 15% is deemed emergency level and some districts are reporting 27%, or one in four children under five, are suffering from acute malnutrition that causes wasting, he said.

“I witnessed…horrific images of starving children, malnourished, and not only the children – mothers, parents and the population in villages we visited,” Daoudi said.

“They are on the periphery of famine, these are images I haven’t seen for quite some time across the globe,” said the veteran aid worker.

WFP is seeking $75 million to cover emergency needs through September, he added.

(Reporting by Stephanie Nebehay; Editing by William Maclean and Mark Heinrich)