Time running out in Horn of Africa as millions confront hunger: UN

With major precipitation failing to materialize nearly a month into the Horn of Africa’s rainy season, the number of people suffering from drought-induced hunger could surge from an estimated 14 million to 20 million by the end of the year, the United Nations’ food agency warns.

The World Food Programme (WFP) says unending drought conditions, exacerbated by stagnant and decreasing humanitarian aid, are straining communities in the Horn of Africa — a large peninsular region in East Africa that generally includes Ethiopia, Eritrea, Somalia and Djibouti as well as parts of Kenya.

This critical situation has been exacerbated by knock-on effects of the war in Ukraine, as food and fuel prices have soared to unprecedented highs, the WFP noted, adding “time is fast running out for families who are struggling to survive.”

“We know from past experience that acting early to avert a humanitarian catastrophe is vital, yet our ability to launch the response has been limited due to a lack of funding to date,” Michael Dunford, WFP’s regional director for Eastern Africa, said in a Tuesday statement.

Somalia is facing a particularly severe risk of famine, while half a million Kenyans are what the WFP described as “one step away from catastrophic levels of hunger.” Meanwhile, malnutrition rates in Ethiopia have surged well above emergency thresholds, according to the WFP.

The cost of a food basket has risen by 66 percent and 36 percent in Ethiopia and Somalia, respectively. Both nations rely on wheat from Black Sea basin countries, the WFP noted, adding that some transit routes have seen a surge in shipping costs since the beginning of the year.

In Ethiopia, the WFP described a situation of widespread crop failure, with over a million livestock deaths and an estimated 7.2 million people waking up hungry every day in the southern and southeastern portions of the country.

While WFP representatives are on the ground, the program said it requires $239 million over the next six months to respond to the drought in this area.

In Kenya, meanwhile, the number of people in need of assistance had increased fourfold in less than two years, according to the WFP. Escalating drought conditions have left 3.1 million people acutely food insecure, including half a million individuals who are confronting emergency levels of hunger.

The WFP said that it requires $42 million over the next six months to nourish the most critically impacted areas in the country’s northern and eastern regions.

As far as Somalia is concerned, the WFP found that some 6 million people — 40 percent of the population — are facing “acute food insecurity,” and that the country faces “a very real risk of famine in the coming months if the rains don’t arrive and humanitarian assistance isn’t received.”

To help bridge these gaps, the WFP said it has been scaling up emergency food and nutrition assistance that will support 3 million people by the middle of this year. However, the organization stressed that it still requires $192 million in relief funding over the next six months.

The WFP said it last pushed for additional funding for the agency in February, but less than 4 percent of requested funding had been secured.

Acknowledging that the Horn of Africa also experienced a severe drought in 2016-2017, the WFP explained that catastrophe was avoided during that period due to early action. At the time, the organization said it was able to scale up assistance before widespread hunger occurred.

This year, however, a critical lack of resources has led to a different situation entirely, the program warned.

“WFP and other humanitarian agencies have been warning the international community since last year that this drought could be disastrous if we didn’t act immediately,” Dunford, the regional director, said.

“But funding has failed to materialize at the scale required,” he added.