Famine will reach parts of Somalia this year, UN warns

The United Nations(UN)  has warned that famine will occur in parts of Somalia between October and December as a drought worsens and global food prices hover near record highs.

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The UN humanitarian chief, Martin Griffiths disclosed this during a news conference in Somalia’s capital, Mogadish, he started “Famine is at the door.

He further explained that he had concrete indications that famine would occur by autumn in parts of south central Somalia.

Somalia and its neighbours in the Horn of Africa, including Ethiopia and Kenya, are in the grip of the worst drought in more than 40 years, which has wiped out livestock and crops.

Humanitarian agencies have been ringing alarm bells over the deteriorating situation for months, with the UN’s World Food Programme (WFP) saying last month that the number of people at risk of starvation across the region had increased to 22 million.

In Somalia alone, the number of people facing crisis hunger levels is 7.8 million, or around half the population, while around one million people have fled their homes in a desperate search for food and water, UN agencies say.

Mr Griffiths arrived in Mogadishu on Thursday for his first visit to Somalia.

He told reporters this morning that he had been “shocked to my core these past few days by the level of pain and suffering” he had witnessed.

“The clock is running – it will soon run out,” he said.

The Horn of Africa is experiencing its worst drought in 40 years, and experts say the region is on track for a fifth consecutive failed rainy season.

Griffiths said the current “situations and trends” resembled those of 2010 and 2011, but that it was “worse” now, due to four failed rainy seasons and decades of conflicts.

In 2011, the country experienced a famine that claimed more than a quarter of a million lives, most of them children.

MTO/Reuters