Middle East war risks pushing 45m more into acute hunger

Amid ongoing hostilities – including Iranian counterstrikes against Gulf states and Israeli attacks on Hezbollah targets in Lebanon – WFP’s shipping costs “are up 18 per cent so far and we have thousands of trucks on the roads every day,” Skau explained. “These are now running on much more expensive fuel, due to the oil prices.”

He deplored the impact of higher costs which “mean that we can buy less food or provide less cash to beneficiaries”.

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The agency has been forced to cut food rations for people in famine conditions in Sudan and is only able to support one in four acutely malnourished children in Afghanistan – currently the world’s worst malnutrition crisis.

Another major concern is related to the disruption of global fertiliser markets “just as sub-Saharan Africa heads into a planting season”, Mr. Skau said.

A quarter of the world’s fertilizer supply comes through the Strait of Hormuz, “which is now at a virtual standstill”, he explained.

Skau stressed that the spike in global food and fuel costs “could leave millions of families priced out of staple foods, particularly in import-dependent countries, like sub-Saharan Africa and Asia.”

“If the Middle East conflict continues through June, an additional 45 million people could be pushed into acute hunger by price rises,” he warned.

“This would take global hunger levels to an all-time record and it’s a terrible, terrible prospect.”

Meanwhile the humanitarian effects of air traffic disruption continue to be felt acutely in Lebanon, one of the epicentres of the conflict, the UN’s top aid official in the country, Imran Riza, told reporters in Geneva.

“In 2024 [during the previous Israel-Lebanon conflict] we were receiving an incredible amount of assistance from the Gulf states, from the Saudis, from Qatar, from the UAE, from Oman, from Bahrain…We were getting a lot from Kuwait, and none of that is happening,” he said. “The air bridge is no longer there.”

Displacement and humanitarian needs across Lebanon have surged as a result of Israeli airstrikes and displacement orders covering ever larger portions of the small Middle Eastern nation’s territory.

Riza said that 132,700 people are staying in some 622 shelters but the total number of those who’ve had to flee their homes is likely more than one million.

“If you think that the population of Lebanon, citizens as well as refugees…, is close to about five and a half million, [we’re] talking about almost 20 per cent of the people living in Lebanon having been displaced - and it’s going to continue,” he said.

The evacuation orders apply to southern Lebanon, Beirut’s southern suburbs and parts of Bekaa.

About 70 per cent of the displaced are not in shelters, Mr. Riza said, which creates challenges for humanitarians trying to reach them.

He also explained that because of military operations it has become very difficult to access people refusing to leave their villages.

He spoke in particular of the elderly, “people who can’t physically move and are very scared to leave”.

“They’re very vulnerable people that are remaining behind - and there are others that want don’t want to risk losing their homes, their villages.”