62 million people need humanitarian help worldwide
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food shortages in Sahel caused by severe drought
The number of people needing humanitarian aid around the world has risen from 51 million to 62 million, an increase of more than 20 per cent, during the first half of this year, according to the United Nations.
Humanitarian partners have raised their funding requirements, from US$7.8 billion, at the beginning of the year, to $8.8 billion.
Julie Walker reports.
More than 18 million people in nine countries in the Sahel region of Africa are facing a severe food and nutrition crisis, worsened by conflict in northern Mali. More than a million children under five are at risk of dying from severe acute malnutrition and over 200,000 people have fled into neighbouring countries.
Conflict, food insecurity and malnutrition have also steeply worsened in Yemen. Sixty per cent of children under five are chronically malnourished, a rate second only to Afghanistan, where so far this year, more than 200,000 people have been affected by some 300 natural disasters. In Syria, hundreds of thousands of people are affected by the intensifying armed conflict, which has caused many to flee to neighbouring countries.
South Sudan is coping with increasing numbers of refugees from Sudan, as well as the return of hundreds of thousands of people of South Sudanese origin from Sudan, amid mounting food insecurity and malnutrition.
The United Nations says 45 per cent of the funding required has been received but this leaves a gap of $4.8 billion for the remainder of this year.
Julie Walker, United Nations
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