Nearly 3.6 million people are at risk of severe food insecurity in Niger

Save the Children highlights that almost half a million children suffer the worst consequences of malnutrition

June 30. (EUROPA PRESS) –

Around 3.6 million people are at risk of severe food insecurity in Niger, close to a seventh of the country’s population, the non-governmental organization Save the Children warned on Thursday, pointing out that this figure is a 57 percent higher than in 2021.

The NGO has highlighted that almost half a million children under the age of five suffer the worst consequences of malnutrition and has added that nearly 36,000 people have arrived in the country in the last six months fleeing violence in Mali, Burkina Faso and the north. from Nigeria.

Thus, he recalled that the African country has suffered in recent years a devastation of crops and livestock due to low rainfall, which aggravates desertification, while the increase in food prices due to the war in Ukraine is deepening the humanitarian crisis. The country is also facing epidemics such as measles and cholera, while insecurity has caused the closure of almost 800 schools.

“Hopes for this year are beginning to fade, with forecasts showing that the food situation is likely to deteriorate further during the lean season,” said Ilaria Manunza, director of Save the Children in Niger. The lean season begins in June, when the food produced in the previous harvest begins to run out and becomes more expensive and difficult to acquire, and ends in October.

In this sense, Manunza has emphasized that “while the world’s attention is focused on the war in Ukraine and other crises, the lives of the children of the Sahel are in danger”. “The situation suffered by children is presented as something terrible, we will have failed if we do not respond in time to help them,” she said.

Adamou Moumouni, a doctor at a Save the Children center for malnourished children in the city of Maradi, explained that “during the lean season, cases of malnutrition increase.” “Here, out of 100 beds, 75 are already occupied. We foresee a deficit of beds in relation to the number of children admitted, which will continue to increase until December,” he added.

The NGO has highlighted that the majority of refugees arriving in Niger are women and children who need food, water, shelter and clothing, as well as access to basic services such as health care and education. This year, an estimated 6.3 million children under the age of five will be malnourished in the Sahel region, including more than 1.4 million who will be severely malnourished, a 62 percent increase from 2018.

Hadjara, a 35-year-old refugee from Nigeria, said that she and her three children last received food “three or four months ago”. “I am engaged in selling millet cakes or I buy and sell things. I borrow money or grain from the neighboring village with the local communities and when I finish the day, I pay back the loan,” she has pointed out. “I want everything to change, everything, for me and my family. I want food. I want my children to go to school,” she stressed.

“Niger, and the entire Sahel, is facing food insecurity of unknown proportions. It is essential that the international community mobilizes to eliminate the grain blockade that is currently in place in Ukraine,” said the executive director of Save the Children. in Spain, Andrés Conde, who has traveled to the country this week to document the situation.