The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has warned that about 6.3 million Somalis will be facing acute food shortage by December.
In a situation report for October, the UN body called for sustained donor support to prevent more people falling into severe hunger, saying that cereal harvest in 2019 was 68% average in southern Somalia and the lowest such harvest recorded since 1995,
The agency said climatic shocks coupled with widespread poverty and vulnerability had led millions of Somalia to severe hunger.
FAO said it needs an additional $66 million to support livelihoods in Somalia through 2019.
The report highlighted that an estimated 2.6 million people remain internally displaced across the country, either scattered among host communities in rural areas or living in formal and informal settlements on the outskirts of urban centers.
“Widespread malnutrition persists across the country and 1 million children are projected to be acutely malnourished over the next year, including 178 400 who are likely to be severely malnourished if interventions are not scaled up,” the reports in part.
