Conflicts, climate crisis aggravate food insecurity – UN

United Nations, Aug 3 (Prensa Latina) Conflicts are key factors in hunger and food insecurity aggravated by climate and economic crises, the UN Famine Prevention and Response Coordinator Reena Ghelani said. She said that while the threat of famine — people starving slowly to death — must be a red line, amid the multiple challenges the world is facing today, the number of people suffering from acute food insecurity reached a quarter billion in 2022 — the highest recorded in recent years.

August 3, 2023
16:57

Some 376,000 of them were facing famine like conditions in seven countries and another 35 million people were on the edge, with women and children the most impacted. “It is a man-made crisis that has been swelling for years.

Each of the seven countries where people faced famine-like conditions in 2022 were affected by armed conflict or extreme levels of violence, and five of those seven countries — Afghanistan, Haiti, Somalia, South Sudan and Yemen — are regularly on the Security Council’s agenda.

Climate change is increasingly becoming a factor that multiplies threats, and as pressure on water and other natural resources increases competition and displacement, conflicts and hunger are spreading, she warned.

In a self-reinforcing cycle, she said, insecurity in conflict-affected nations hampers climate adaptation efforts, leaving already vulnerable communities even poorer, hungrier and less resilient.

Ghelani urged the UN to double down on ending conflict in all its forms, ensuring that warring parties respect international humanitarian law and making better use of existing early warning mechanisms.

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