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Food distribution in Old Fangak, South Sudan: "Hunger leads to flight, flight all too often leads to impoverishment"
Photo: Sam Mednick/dpa
Welthungerhilfe has massively criticized the cuts in funding by the World Food Program (WFP) in South Sudan.
"This will have fatal consequences for millions of people, because the reduction in vital food aid comes at a very bad time for the people of South Sudan," said Jessica Kühnle from the Welthungerhilfe office in Juba, the capital of South Sudan.
“The number of people who do not have enough to eat has reached the highest level since the country gained independence in 2011.”
Acting WFP Director Adeyinka Badejo-Sanogo announced Tuesday that lack of funds in South Sudan has forced WFP to suspend food rations for 1.7 million starving people.
However, two thirds of the country's eleven million inhabitants actually need support.
According to Kühnle, many households in South Sudan have already used up all or most of their food supplies due to the poor harvest of the previous year.
Although South Sudan is only slightly dependent on imports from Ukraine or Russia, the price increases resulting from the war indirectly contribute to worsening hunger in South Sudan.
The high prices are unaffordable for many rural and urban households.
There was also a risk of severe flooding in parts of South Sudan this year, which would destroy entire crops and livelihoods for the fourth year in a row.
Meanwhile, the Malteser-Hilfsdienst warned that hunger, exacerbated by the lack of grain imports from Russia and Ukraine, could trigger new refugee movements.
One example is the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which gets 80 percent of its grain supplies from there.
"Hunger leads to flight, unfortunately flight all too often leads to impoverishment," said Roland Hansen, head of Malteser International's Africa department.
Famine is also looming in the Horn of Africa, where a prolonged drought has already displaced more than a million people in Somalia, Ethiopia and northern Kenya.
According to the UN, more than 18.4 million people in the region are at risk of food shortages, hunger and malnutrition.
mik/dpa-AFX