May 29. (EUROPE PRESS) –
The UN has updated this Monday its list of black spots of hunger, to which Haiti, Sudan and the Sahel are added, at a time when international experts fear not only the consequences of contexts of violence and conflict but also of phenomena meteorological events such as ‘El Niño’, which is expected to be more frequent this year.
The World Food Program (FAO) and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) have called for urgent measures in the face of the chain of crises in areas that already suffer from serious deficiencies. The two agencies, which examine the period from June to November, have detected 18 worrying points in terms of food insecurity, spread over a total of 22 countries.
Added to Afghanistan, Nigeria, Somalia, South Sudan and Yemen are Haiti, marked by political instability and gang violence; Sudan, the scene of fighting between the main armed factions since mid-April; and Burkina Faso and Mali, two countries that reflect the current challenges of the Sahel.
In all of them, the experts detect or fear that extreme food-level situations will occur, an abyss that the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Central African Republic, Ethiopia, Kenya, Pakistan and Burma are also looming. The UN has also added Lebanon and Malawi as a potential source of hunger, as well as all of Central America — El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua.
In the case of Sudan, the UN estimates that more than a million people will flee the country and another 2.5 million will become internally displaced, which will foreseeably increase the level of needs both in Sudanese territory and in neighboring countries. . In addition, the report warns that insecurity can cause a reduction in the flow of humanitarian aid and also cuts in supply routes, especially due to fewer entries and exits from Port Sudan.
EFFECTS OF THE CLIMATE AND THE ECONOMY
Meteorologists anticipate that an especially active ‘El Niño’ season is coming -it will increase with an 83 percent probability-, which would be noticeable in contexts such as the Dry Corridor of Central America and fuels fear of extreme events in the Sahel and the Horn of Africa, all of them areas that appear among the scenarios to be taken into account in the opinion of the FAO and the WFP.
Added to the weather challenge are others of an economic nature, ranging from the still pending burdens of the COVID-19 pandemic to those derived from the Russian military offensive on Ukraine, which has caused, for example, a rise in prices of basic products. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) forecasts global GDP growth this year of 2.8 percent, the lowest rate in a decade.
FAO Director-General Qu Dongyu has advocated for new approaches, for example with agricultural interventions that help hungry people from the bottom up, or investing in disaster risk reduction, to “ensure that no one is left behind.” back”.
In this sense, the executive director of the WFP, Cindy McCain, has called to “act now to save lives”, since otherwise “the results will be catastrophic”. “Not only are there more hungry people in more places, but the severity is greater than ever,” she has warned.
