UN. hunger is spreading around the world

Several United Nations agencies on Monday sounded an alarm over the food crisis in Yemen, warning of an expected fivefold increase in food scarcity conditions. The warnings from the Food and Agriculture Organization, the World Food Program (WFP) and UNICEF came in response to the newly published Integrated Phase Classification (IPC) analysis on Yemen, which attributes the the main fault of the food crisis on the ongoing conflict.

The IPC is a UN initiative to assess food insecurity in the world's poorest countries. "The resounding result" of the new report, said David Gressly, a resident of the United Nations and humanitarian coordinator for Yemen, "is that we must act now".
The IPC analysis expresses particular concern that 31,000 people in the country are currently facing extreme hunger levels – what it classifies as a Phase 5 catastrophe – and that the figure is expected to rise to 161,000 in the second half of the year. year. The report also classified 17.4 million people in Yemen in at least one phase of 'severe' phase 3 acute malnutrition and in need of assistance. The number is expected to rise to a record 19 million by June.

There are also 2.2 million severely malnourished children, including 538,000 severely. Further worrying is that 1.3 million pregnant and lactating women also suffer from acute malnutrition.

"More and more children are going to bed hungry in Yemen," said UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell. "This exposes them to a greater risk of physical and cognitive impairment and even death."

"The plight of children in Yemen can no longer be overlooked," he said. "There are lives at stake". The new figures come during the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which forced 2.5 million Ukrainians to flee and triggered a food and fuel crisis.

Yemen is heavily dependent on food imports and imports about 30 percent of its grain from Ukraine, according to the UN.

In a statement earlier this month, WFP Executive Director David Beasley linked the invasion of Ukraine with the catastrophe in Yemen, warning that “the bullets and bombs in Ukraine could bring the global hunger crisis to levels superior to those we have seen before ".

He warned that the war will impact global supply chains and the cost of food. Immediately after Russia launched its invasion, Beasley expressed concern that malnourished Yemeni children have been "forgotten by the world".

Reacting to the IPC report on Wednesday, Beasley said: "These heartbreaking numbers confirm that we are on a countdown to the catastrophe in Yemen and we are almost out of time to avoid it."

"Unless we receive substantial new funding immediately, mass starvation and famine will follow," he said. "But if we act now, there is still a chance to avert an impending disaster and save millions of people."

These are consequences in the undeveloped world of the war in Ukraine, which involves nearly 11% of world grain production. The fact that many will be starving for too high grain prices.

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The UN article. hunger is spreading around the world comes from ScenariEconomici.it .

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This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/onu-la-fame-si-sta-diffondendo-nel-mondo/ on Wed, 16 Mar 2022 08:00:22 +0000.