The United Nations expects the crisis to worsen and 4.6 million people will need food assistance by May 2022.
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The United Nations is sounding the alarm bells. About one in four people are at risk of severe hunger in Somalia, due to the drought affecting the country, after three seasons of low rainfall and a fourth in sight, the United Nations warned on Monday (December 20th). The organization expects 4.6 million people to need food assistance by May 2022.
Shortages of food, water and pasture have already forced 169,000 people to leave their homes, a number that could reach 1.4 million within six months, notes the UN in its press release. “It is an incredible disaster that is brewing”, explains Adam Abdelmoula, UN humanitarian coordinator for Somalia. According to him, 300,000 children under five will be exposed to severe malnutrition in the coming months: “They will die if we don’t help them quickly.”
In November, the Somali government declared the drought a humanitarian emergency. In recent years, natural disasters, not conflict, have been the main cause of displacement in Somalia, a country ranked among the most vulnerable to climate change. Experts believe that the frequency and intensity of extreme events is increasing, attributing it to climate change.
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