Covid-19 and climate threats: the United Nations call for help in the face of famine
The UN warns: 400,000 children under five could die of acute malnutrition "without emergency treatment".
Here in Sana'a, February 13, 2021. REUTERS - KHALED ABDULLAH
Text by: RFI Follow
4 min
On March 11, at the UN, Secretary General Antonio Guterres warned the Security Council that without "immediate action" millions of people around the world risk starvation and death.
Due to climatic shocks and the Covid-19 pandemic, the situation has worsened in recent months.
In some thirty countries, 34 million people are close to being declared in a situation of famine.
This prompted the UN and its agencies to appeal for donations of $ 5.5 billion.
Publicity
Read more
With our correspondent in New York,
Carrie Nooten
The dizzying statistics on famine follow one another.
This March 11, at the Security Council, between the figures, the American ambassador mentioned this two-year-old girl who died in front of her in a refugee camp in northern Uganda, thirty years ago.
David Besley, the head of the World Food Program (WFP), spoke of this hungry five-month-old baby, whom he met three days ago
in Yemen
, and who died yesterday Thursday.
The difference in thirty years is now to be found in this perverse link between conflict and famine.
Millions of children are hungry because armed groups won't lay down their guns.
34M people in 30+ countries are on the brink.
These looming famines are:
1. driven by conflict
2. entirely preventable
As I explained to the @UN Security Council, they have the power to save lives.
- David Beasley (@WFPChief) March 11, 2021
New famines, new wars
“
We have made enormous progress against famine in recent decades, thanks to better productivity and poverty reduction
,” explained Secretary General Antonio Guterres.
Famine and hunger are no longer a question of lack of food.
They are, now, largely
"
man-made
"
- and I use the term on purpose.
Because it is in conflict zones, on a large scale, that they are most present and they are increasing
”.
Famine & hunger are no longer about lack of food.
They are now largely man-made - concentrated in countries affected by large-scale, protracted conflict.
We have a responsibility to do everything in our power to tackle both hunger and conflict, if we are to solve either.
pic.twitter.com/dgStLIWDgf
- António Guterres (@antonioguterres) March 11, 2021
At the end of 2020, 88 million people were suffering from acute hunger due to conflict, an increase of 20% in just one year.
Hunger crises are accelerating in South Sudan, Yemen and Afghanistan, and spreading to the Sahel and the Horn of Africa.
Antonio Guterres warned the Council against a vicious cycle: if these famines were not addressed, they in turn would cause new wars.
► From war to famine: 20 million people in danger
Newsletter
Receive all international news directly in your mailbox
I subscribe
Follow all the international news by downloading the RFI application
google-play-badge_FR
Humanitarian
UN
On the same subject
Africa report
Drought and famine in southern Madagascar: the vicious circle of land clearing (3/4)
Famine in southern Africa: a quiet crisis at the top of the AU
Correspondents' world tour
Risk of famine in North Korea, health crisis and mafias in Italy