U.N. allocates $250 million for crises like famine threat in Africa

Addis Ababa: The United Nations will spend $250 million from its emergency fund to tackle “forgotten crises’ around the world, including helping communities that are facing the risk of famine in Africa, its secretary general said on Saturday.

“I’m announcing the largest-ever allocation from our United Nations Central Emergency Response Fund,” Antonio Guterres was quoted by Reuters as saying in a news conference on the sidelines of the annual African Union summit in Ethiopia.

Communities across Africa including in Kenya, Nigeria, Ethiopia and Somalia are facing the worst food crisis seen in 40 years. It’s the worst crisis in decades – yet it’s only just hitting the headlines.

Global factors such as ongoing climate change in Africa, the escalating conflict in Ukraine, inflation around the world and a surge in global food prices have caused devastating ripples across the globe, according to the British Red Cross.

But this extreme hunger is hitting great swathes of Africa in the Horn of Africa and the Sahel particularly hard. In Somalia alone, 7 million people are on the brink of famine, In the Baidoa and Burhakaba districts, growing numbers of children are already dying.

The World Health Organization (WHO) had last year warned that the Greater Horn of Africa is experiencing one of the worst hunger crises of the last 70 years. An estimated 37 million people are facing acute hunger, with approximately seven million children under the age of five acutely malnourished in the region.

WHO said that  Climate change, conflict, rising food prices and the COVID-19 pandemic have compounded one of the worst droughts in the region in recent decades.

With inputs from agencies.

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