The progress made in fighting global hunger has been set back 15 years, leaving around 733 million people going hungry in 2023.
This is the equivalent of one in 11 people globally and one in five in Africa, a latest UN State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI) report, published Wednesday has shown.
“The bottom line is that we are still far off-track towards the goal of ridding the world of hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition by 2030,” said Maximo Torero, Chief Economist at the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), in reference to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and specifically SDG 2: Zero Hunger.
Mr. Torero noted that if current trends persist, around 582 million people will still face hunger in 2030, half of them in Africa.
Despite progress in combating stunting and in promoting breastfeeding, global hunger levels have remained stubbornly static for three consecutive years. Between 713 million and 757 million people were undernourished in 2023, around 152 million more than in 2019, according to the report, a joint publication by FAO, the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the UN World Food Programme (WFP), and the UN World Health Organization (WHO).
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Regional trends show a stark contrast with hunger continuing to rise in Africa, affecting 20.4 per cent of the population, while remaining stable in Asia at 8.1 per cent. This is a significant concern given that the region houses more than half of those facing hunger worldwide.
Latin America has shown some progress with 6.2 percent of its population facing hunger. However, from 2022 to 2023, hunger increased in Western Asia, the Caribbean, and most African subregions.
FAO’s Mr. Torero highlighted that Africa faces a unique challenge as it is the only region where hunger has risen owing to all three major drivers: conflict, climate extremes and economic downturns. Of them all, he emphasized that war remains “a major driver” of hunger, exacerbating the food crisis across countries.
