Sudan faces worsening hunger despite aid gains, WFP warns
Sudan is at risk of slipping deeper into a food crisis as ongoing conflict, declining humanitarian funding and rising farming costs threaten to reverse recent progress in tackling famine, a senior official of the World Food Programme (WFP) has warned.
The country remains engulfed in a civil war between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), now in its fourth year. The conflict has displaced millions of people, devastated communities and severely restricted humanitarian access, worsening food insecurity across the country.
Speaking to Reuters, WFP Acting Executive Director Carl Skau said Sudan continues to face the world’s largest humanitarian emergency, with around five million people experiencing emergency or catastrophic levels of hunger. Although intensified humanitarian efforts have reduced the number of people living in famine-like conditions, more than 100,000 people remain in the most severe category of the UN-backed Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), indicating an extremely critical situation.
Nearly 19.5 million people across Sudan are currently suffering acute food insecurity. Skau expressed concern over renewed fighting around Al-Obeid in North Kordofan, warning that the city could face conditions similar to those in Al-Fashir, where conflict and sieges have trapped civilians and obstructed the delivery of aid. While violence has eased slightly in recent days, allowing hopes of expanding food assistance, renewed clashes in Darfur have forced the closure of the Tine border crossing from Chad, disrupting a key humanitarian supply route.
The WFP has also been forced to reduce both the number of people it supports and the size of food rations because of a funding shortfall of $646 million following aid cuts by major donors, including the United States, several European countries and the United Kingdom. Assistance has fallen from about five million people a year ago to roughly 3.5 million today.
Skau further cautioned that soaring diesel prices and shortages of fertiliser linked to tensions in the Gulf and disruptions around the Strait of Hormuz could further weaken agricultural production during the current planting season. Sudan depends heavily on fertiliser imports from Gulf countries, while many farmers rely on diesel-powered irrigation systems that are becoming increasingly unaffordable, raising fears that food production could decline further.
Source: Reuters
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