UN Geneva - Multimedia Newsroom : Hunger in Northen Ethiopia

The number of people in need of humanitarian food assistance across northern Ethiopia has spiked as a direct result of ongoing conflict, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) said on Friday.

“Today, 9.4 million people are living their worst nightmare,” said Tomson Phiri, WFP spokesperson, speaking in Geneva.

Of the people across northern Ethiopia in need of assistance, more than 80 per cent - equivalent to 7.8 million - “are behind battle lines”.

The largest jump in numbers has occurred in Amhara region with 3.7 million people now in urgent need of humanitarian aid. Screening data from all three regions in Northern Ethiopia has shown malnutrition rates of between 16 and 28 per cent for children.

Even more alarming, up to 50 per cent of pregnant and breastfeeding women screened in Amhara and Tigray were also found to be malnourished.

According to the WFP spokesperson, “a convoy loaded with 2,200 metric tones of life-saving food is expected to arrive in Mekele (in Tigray) in the coming days; 35 trucks have arrived so far and trucks loaded with food from Kombolcha are being sent into Southern Tigray today”.

Corridors into Tigray had been closed owing to the recent Tigrayan advances into Afar and Amhara, as well as severe disruptions linked to federal government approvals.

Mr. Phiri pointed out that this has meant that less than a third of the supplies needed have entered the region since mid-July.

According to Mr. Phiri, one million litres of fuel is also needed to be able to reach the 7.8 million people behind battle lines. He noted that Tigray authorities have an initial batch of 45,000 litres of fuel available to support the scale-up of food assistance in Tigray.

While WFP has reached 180,000 people in Tigray in this current round, this amounts to “just seven per cent of the 2.5 million WFP needs to reach, he added.

“A famine has not been declared in Ethiopia, but...we are running out of words really to capture exactly the situation that is unfolding before our eyes, but... it is the textbook definition of a humanitarian crisis.”

Earlier this week WFP delivered food to over 10,000 people in the Amhara towns of Dessie and Kombolcha. These were the first distributions to happen there since they were taken over by Tigray forces almost a month ago. WFP was only granted full access to its warehouses in the region last week.

To date, WFP has reached more than 3.2 million people with emergency food and nutrition assistance across northern Ethiopia, including 875,000 vulnerable mothers and children with nutritionally fortified food. In Amhara, WFP has reached more than 220,000 people with food and nutrition assistance and is scaling up to reach 650,000 people. In Afar, WFP has distributed food to 124,000 people out of its targeted 534,000.

Mr. Phiri called for urgent action to be taken to help WFP deliver assistance over the next six months. At least $316 million is required for Northern Ethiopia, with an unprecedented $579 million to save and change the lives of 12 million people across the country over the next six months.

ENDS

Hunger in Northen Ethiopia - WFP

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