By Abdullahi Lukman
Acute food insecurity and child malnutrition escalated for the sixth straight year in 2024, impacting more than 295 million people across 53 countries, according to the 2025 Global Report on Food Crises released by the United Nations on Friday.
This marks a 5% increase from 2023, with crisis-level hunger or worse affecting 22.6% of populations in the hardest-hit regions.
The report highlights conflict, extreme weather, and economic shocks—often overlapping—as the primary drivers of this worsening crisis. The outlook for 2025 is grim, with the U.N. warning of a dramatic decline in humanitarian food assistance funding, projected to fall by 10% to over 45%.
U.S. President Donald Trump’s near-total dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development has intensified the crisis. Over 80% of its humanitarian programs have been cancelled, threatening the survival of millions.
“Millions of hungry people have lost, or will soon lose, the critical lifeline we provide,” warned Cindy McCain, head of the World Food Programme.
In 2024, conflict remained the leading cause of hunger, affecting nearly 140 million people in 20 countries, with catastrophic levels of food insecurity in Gaza, South Sudan, Haiti, Mali, and confirmed famine in Sudan.
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Economic shocks—including inflation and currency collapse—pushed 59.4 million people into crisis, notably in Syria and Yemen.
Meanwhile, climate extremes linked to El Niño brought droughts and floods that plunged 96 million people across 18 countries into food insecurity, especially in Southern Africa, Southern Asia, and the Horn of Africa.
The number of individuals facing famine-like conditions more than doubled to 1.9 million, the highest recorded since the global report’s inception in 2016.
Malnutrition among children is also at crisis levels, with 38 million children under five acutely malnourished across 26 nutrition emergencies, including in Sudan, Yemen, Mali, and Gaza.
Displacement has further deepened the crisis, with nearly 95 million forcibly displaced people—including refugees and internally displaced persons—living in countries experiencing food emergencies, such as the Democratic Republic of Congo and Colombia.
Despite the overall deterioration, some progress was noted in 15 countries, including Ukraine, Kenya, and Guatemala, where food security improved due to humanitarian efforts, better harvests, reduced conflict, and slowing inflation.
To address the root causes of hunger, the report urges greater investment in local food systems. “Supporting local agriculture can help the most people, with dignity, and at lower cost,” said Rein Paulsen, Director of Emergencies and Resilience at the FAO.
