WFP: Millions in West, Central Africa Facing Hunger Emergency
Voice of America
GENEVA - The United Nations World Food Program warns that millions of people in West and Central Africa are facing catastrophic levels of hunger driven by conflict and soaring food prices.
More than 31 million people, an increase of 10 million over last year, are expected to be unable to feed themselves during the upcoming June to August lean season. This period precedes the next harvest and is the time of year when food stocks in West Africa are at their lowest. A U.N. food analysis found nearly 2.7 million people are a step away from famine. Among them, it says some 800,000 people are facing emergency levels of hunger in northeast Nigeria's conflict-ridden states of Borno, Adamawa and Yobe. World Food Program spokesman Tomson Phiri says years of conflict have uprooted millions of people from their homes, destroying their livelihoods and making them dependent upon international aid. He says high food prices also are stoking the growing hunger emergency in the region.A villager shows maize crops wilting in a field, in Mumijo, Buhera district, east of the capital Harare, Zimbabwe, March 16, 2024. Christiane Rudert, nutrition adviser for UNICEF in eastern and southern Africa (Courtesy: UNICEF) Wongani Grace Taulo, regional education adviser UNICEF eastern and southern Africa. (Courtesy: UNICEF) UNICEF says it is attempting to help students and their families in the region learn ways of coping with climate change through the schools, in Harare, January 2024.
Security personnel inspect the site of a suicide attack in the Shangla district of Pakistan's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province on March 26, 2024. Five Chinese nationals working on a construction site were killed along with their driver by a suicide bomber. Security personnel inspect the site of a suicide attack near Besham city in the Shangla district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province on March 26, 2024. A map of Pakistan locating the Dasu dam site in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.