A United Nations-backed food security report concluded Thursday that more than a year of war in Sudan has pushed parts of North Darfur into famine, including a displaced persons camp that houses more than half a million people. The UN World Food Programme (WFP) is urgently calling on all warring parties to allow humanitarian food assistance by freeing up key access points within the country and at its borders.
"According to the report, catastrophic hunger conditions are projected for the first time in the history of the IPC survey in Sudan, and 14 areas have been declared 'at risk of famine' in the coming months," UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric told reporters on Thursday about the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, the global monitor for food insecurity.
The IPC says famine conditions are prevalent in North Darfur, including at the Zamzam displacement camp, which is about 12 kilometers - 7 miles - south of the state capital, El Fasher, and are likely to persist through the end of October.
The Zamzam camp is home to more than 220,000 displaced people who are facing starvation as more and more people are forced to flee the ongoing fighting in the besieged town of El Fasher - an immediate cessation of hostilities in the North Darfur capital and other conflict hotspots is critical to scale up assistance to people in the most desperate circumstances.
The IPC does not declare famine, but provides the evidence for an official declaration. Zamzam camp was one of 14 areas - in conflict zones in Darfur, Khartoum, Kordofan and Gezira - identified as being at risk of famine in the latest report by the Famine Review Committee of the Integrated Food Phase Classification.
Famine is determined when, in a given area, at least 20 percent of households face extreme food shortages, at least 30 percent of children suffer from acute malnutrition, and the daily death rate exceeds 2 per 10,000.
The UN says the intensified fighting in El Fasher has displaced some 320,000 people since mid-April, with some 150,000 to 200,000 believed to have moved to Zamzam camp since mid-May. The camp population is said to have swelled to over 500,000 in just a few weeks.
Deadly clashes in the capital of North Darfur state have hit residential areas, markets, hospitals and sites hosting displaced people. The humanitarian situation in El Fasher, where people have been trapped by fighting for months, is critical.
“This is entirely a man-made famine. The war between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has devastated Sudan’s economy, driven more than 10 million people from their homes, and prevented humanitarian agencies from reaching starving populations,” said Samantha Power, Administrator of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) in a statement Thursday.
“RSF’s ongoing siege of El Fasher has trapped civilians in Zamzam, and both the SAF and RSF – enabled by external patrons – are using starvation as a weapon of war, actively preventing food, including life-saving emergency nutritional supplements, from reaching people in need.”
Fighting between rival generals leading the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) over the past 15 months has severely hampered humanitarian access and exacerbated the hunger crisis.
The conflict between the SAF and RSF continues to spread across the country, with clashes currently raging in El Fasher and Sennar State in the south-east of the country. Each escalation of fighting makes it more dangerous to deliver aid and compounds humanitarian needs.
In addition to areas facing famine, the UN warns that half of the country's population - some 25.6 million people - are at crisis levels of food insecurity or worse.
More than half the population is now facing acute hunger - including 755,000 people facing catastrophic conditions (IPC5), with hunger-related deaths already recorded. Every second Sudanese struggles to put enough food on the table every day.
8.5 million people are facing emergency levels of hunger (IPC4). People experiencing emergency levels of hunger are also at risk of dying from hunger-related causes. The worst conditions are in areas most affected by fighting and where conflict-displaced people are concentrated.
Catastrophic hunger (IPC5) is projected for Sudan for the first time in the history of the IPC. Famine has been declared in one area and 13 other areas are at risk of famine in the coming months.
Dujarric said the WFP is rapidly scaling up its emergency response and trying to find new ways to reach millions of people across Sudan, especially in hard-to-reach areas.
"Our colleagues at WFP are telling us that we are in a race against time to stop famine in its tracks," Dujarric said. "But there is an urgent need for a massive increase in funding to ramp up assistance at the scale required to avert famine."
The United Nations has appealed for US$2.7 billion for Sudan this year, but has received only 32 percent of that amount - US$870 million.
In a separate statement on Thursday, the World Food Programme urged all warring parties to allow humanitarian food assistance by freeing up key access points inside the country and at its borders. Humanitarian organizations urgently need guarantees of safe passage for those delivering life-saving assistance to communities in the most desperate circumstances, the UN agency said.
“It is not too late to stop famine from spreading to other parts of the country,” said WFP Executive Director Cindy McCain. “To save lives and prevent widespread starvation in Sudan, we must be able to reach all areas where people are in need.”
She added: “The Sudanese people are counting on us as their lifeline after enduring unimaginable hardship since this conflict began.”
WFP has been warning of a spiraling hunger crisis since war erupted in the country in April 2023 – now, this is the first determination of famine in seven years, meaning people in Zamzam have already started dying of malnutrition and hunger.
The latest figures from the IPC's Famine Review Committee confirmed its worst fears, the UN agency said. Due to lack of access when fighting erupted in El Fasher in March and continues to escalate, WFP has not been unable to transport aid supplies into Zamzam camp since April.
Currently, the only authorized cross-border route into the Darfur region is from Tine in Chad into North Darfur. However, the Tine crossing is now largely impassable for trucks due to seasonal flooding. The Adre border crossing from Chad into West Darfur remains closed by the Sudanese government.
"We and our partners warn that if the war doesn't stop, more and more people are being pushed into catastrophic levels of hunger," Dujarric said.
Non-governmental organization (NGO) Mercy Corps said the IPC famine report is "merely the tip of the iceberg."
"We can only imagine the extent of starvation and deprivation in other regions where we lack similar data, particularly in the 14 areas identified in the latest IPC report, including Greater Darfur, the Kordofan areas, and Khartoum State," Barrett Alexander, Mercy Corps' director of programs for Sudan, said in a statement.
He said a recent assessment by his team in Central and South Darfur found that 9 out of 10 children, particularly those under age 5, are suffering from life-threatening malnutrition.
US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield says the IPC report confirms what was known already — that people have been and continue to die in Sudan from starvation.
"Families who fled horrific violence have been going hungry for months," she said in a statement. "Children have been eating dirt and leaves, and every day, babies have been starving to death."
She urged the warring parties to attend the cease-fire talks in Switzerland on August 14, which the United States is mediating, and Switzerland and Saudi Arabia are co-hosting.
With at least 25 million people in need of aid, the conflict in Sudan, which began on April 15, 2023, has created not only the world's largest hunger crisis, but also the world's largest humanitarian crisis.
The war has killed and injured tens of thousands of people, led to large-scale atrocities, and caused massive displacement. Over the course of fifteen months, more than 10.4 million people - including more than 5 million children - have been displaced as a result of the ongoing conflict.
While more than 8.1 million people - Sudanese and refugees already living in the country - have been displaced within Sudan, more than 2.3 million women, men and children have sought refuge in other countries.
Most of the Sudanese who have crossed borders have sought refuge in the seven countries surrounding the northeastern African nation. South Sudan has received the largest number of people from Sudan - more than 750,000 - many of them South Sudanese returning after many years. Chad has seen the largest influx of refugees in its history, with about 630,000 people crossing the border.
As of July 2024, more than 10.8 million women, men, and children have been internally displaced by conflict in the country - 2.8 million before April 2023 - making Sudan the largest internal displacement crisis in the world.
The total number of Sudanese refugees is estimated at more than 2.8 million, including those forced to flee before April 2023. In total, more than 13.5 million people have now been displaced by the conflict in Sudan, making it the worst displacement crisis in the world and one of the two largest crises alongside the conflict in Syria.
Clashes between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces in Sennar State have forced more than 150,000 people to flee their homes since fighting erupted in late June, many for the second or third time since the war began.
The escalation of fighting in Sudan's southwestern state of Sennar has severely hampered the delivery of humanitarian aid to much of the country. It is cutting off critical cross-line supply routes for the resupply and delivery of aid to affected populations from a key humanitarian hub in Kosti in White Nile State.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), nearly 15 million people need urgent health assistance to survive. Less than 25 percent of health facilities are functioning in the Sudanese states most affected by the war, and only 45 percent of such facilities are fully functional in other states. Hospitals that remain fully or partially functional risk closing for lack of medical staff, supplies, water and electricity.
Some information for this report provided by VOA.
Further information
Full text: FAMINE IN SUDAN: IPC Famine Review Committee Confirms Famine Conditions in parts of North Darfur, CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS, IPC, report, published August 1, 2024
https://www.ipcinfo.org/fileadmin/user_upload/ipcinfo/docs/IPC_Famine_Review_Committee_Report_Sudan_July2024.pdf
Full text: Famine in Sudan: WFP calls for unfettered access to hunger hotspots to save lives, World Food Programme, press release, published August 1, 2024
https://www.wfp.org/stories/famine-sudan-wfp-calls-unfettered-access-hunger-hotspots-save-lives
Full text: Mercy Corps Statement on Sudan Famine Review Committee Confirming Famine Conditions in North Darfur, Mercy Corps, statement, published August 1, 2024
https://www.mercycorps.org/press-room/releases/statement-on-sudan-famine-review-committee-confirming-famine-conditions-in-north-darfur
Full text: Famine Review Committee Confirms Famine in Sudan’s Zamzam IDP Camp, United States Agency for International Development, Statement by Administrator Samantha Power, published August 1, 2024
https://www.usaid.gov/news-information/press-releases/aug-01-2024-famine-review-committee-confirms-famine-sudans-zamzam-idp-camp