Somalia Faces a Destructive Famine

On August 12, the United Nations warned of a famine in Somalia, saying that "hundreds of thousands of Somalis are one step away from famine."

UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric told a news conference in New York: "After 4 consecutive dry seasons (in Somalia), the fifth is likely to be catastrophic, coming after the worst drought in 40 years."

"Somalia is on the brink of disaster, with hundreds of thousands of people one step away from famine," he said.

"Catastrophic food insecurity was confirmed for the first time since 2017, affecting more than 213,000 people, and our humanitarian colleagues have informed us that 7.1 million Somalis are severely food insecure and that another 6.4 million lack access to safe drinking water and sanitation," he added.

"Since last January, at least 500 children have died of malnutrition and disease across Somalia. It is estimated that an estimated 1.5 million children under the age of five (in Somalia) are acutely malnourished," Dujarric noted.

Recently, warnings of deteriorating humanitarian conditions in Somalia and famine have increased as a result of the lack of an effective response to assistance.

In late July, Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, speaking in the capital Mogadishu, warned that the situation in his country was "slipping into the worst, and may reach the situation we were warning of, which is famine, where deaths are recorded in some areas."

 

Humanitarian Crisis

Millions of Somalis are facing the specters of famine and death as the seasons of severe drought, as well as political and economic turmoil locally and globally, face the continuing effects of the Covid-19 pandemic and the repercussions of the Russian-Ukrainian war, which has resulted in a significant rise in prices and a lack of funding for basic items, in exchange for the failure of humanitarian assistance to meet the growing needs.

The situation is no better in Somalia's neighboring countries, with the World Health Organization (WHO) warning on August 2 that the Horn of Africa is experiencing one of the worst famines in the past seventy years.

"More than 37 million people face acute hunger, and some seven million children under the age of five suffer from acute malnutrition," WHO said.

This is despite international efforts trying to alleviate these crises around the world, the latest of which was the signing of the "wheat agreement" in Istanbul under the auspices of the United Nations, under which the export of wheat from Russia and Ukraine, which was stopped due to the war, is allowed.

 

Health Challenges

Various international organizations agree that a serious crisis threatens the lives of millions in the Horn of Africa, which includes the countries of Djibouti, Somalia, Sudan, South Sudan, Ethiopia, Uganda, and Kenya, with the sharp decline of water resources, the increase in food insecurity, the rise in human displacement waves, and the health and security challenges they pose.

In this context, the WHO revealed that the risks of famine and malnutrition will cause massive migrations to access water and other vital services, which will lead to an increase in infection and outbreaks of diseases such as acute watery diarrhea and cholera.

The WHO appealed to the international community to allocate more than $120 million to respond to growing health needs and prevent the food crisis from turning into a health crisis, stressing the necessity of urgent intervention to avoid preventable diseases and deaths.

WHO revealed that it has allocated "$16.5 million from its Emergency Reserve Fund to ensure that the region's population has access to health services, the treatment of sick children with acute malnutrition, and the prevention, detection, and response to infectious diseases."

But that figure remains inadequate, says Ibrahim Soussi Fall, WHO's Assistant Director-General for Emergency Response: "The situation is already catastrophic, and we need to act now. We can't follow up in light of this underfunding crisis."

The drought and undernourishment crises have also resulted in large waves of migration, according to UNHCR spokeswoman Shabia Mantoo, who revealed during a press conference in late June that as the crisis worsened, hundreds of thousands of people were forced to flee their homes in search of life-saving assistance.

She also pointed out that since the end of last year, more than 800,000 people in Somalia have been internally displaced, and nearly 16,000 have crossed the border into Ethiopia. These numbers are expected to rise over the next few months.

These huge figures of displacement and migration in the Horn of Africa come to reinforce the warnings of the World Bank on the effects of climate change in the countries of the South, as earlier this year, a rise in migration and asylum rates in these areas are expected due to the problems of drought, lack of nutrition, and scarcity of water resources.

 

Absence of Arab Role

According to the office of the Somali president's special envoy for drought, Abdul Rahman Abdul Shakour, his country "faces a difficult humanitarian crisis amid the absence of an Arab role in humanitarian response efforts to prevent the crisis from turning into famine."

Abdul Shakour told Anadolu Agency that "the humanitarian situation seems to be in crisis due to the lack of an effective response to aid as a result of the world's preoccupation with the Ukraine crisis as well as the economic obstacles faced by the countries of the world."

"The presence of Arab support in the humanitarian aid efforts to Somalia is still almost absent because efforts require at the level of states, not bodies," he added.

"The Arab absence at the donor conference in Geneva last April has negatively affected the decline in the actual response to humanitarian aid to Somalia," he said while warning of "a famine crisis if the situation continues along these lines."

"Humanitarian bodies are unable to contain the crisis," he noted, mentioning that it "requires intervention at the state level."

Abdul Shakour appealed to "Arab countries to direct their potential to support Somalia and save millions of Somali people who are in danger of death."

Last Sunday, the Arab Parliament stressed that "the humanitarian crisis that Somalia is going through requires immediate action to support it from the international community and donor institutions."

Regarding the Arab role, the director of the World Food Program in Somalia, El-Khidir Daloum, said in press statements that "the volume of assistance provided by Arab countries so far does not amount to the catastrophe," calling for "the lifting of the aid mechanism for Somalia."