Southern African countries removed from UN ‘Hunger Hotspot' list as harvests improve
For southern Africa at least, this is a welcome development which will blunt the twin blades of hunger and food inflation while lifting growth in economies that rely heavily on agriculture.
The legacy of last year's scorching El Niño event is now receding in southern Africa and several countries in the region have just been removed from the UN's Hunger Hotspot list as harvests have significantly improved from the previous season's drought.
Tens of millions of people in Zambia, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Mozambique and Lesotho were in need of food aid just a few months ago in the face of the 2023/24 El Niño event, which left a trail of misery and wilted crops in its wake.
'Ethiopia, Kenya, Lebanon, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Zambia and Zimbabwe have been removed from the Hunger Hotspots list,' The UN's World Food Programme (WFP) and the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said on Monday in their semi-annual Hunger Hotspots report:
'In east and southern Africa, as well as in Niger, better climatic conditions for harvests and fewer weather extremes have eased food security pressures. However, the FAO and WFP warn that these gains remain fragile and could reverse quickly if shocks re-emerge.'
For southern Africa at least, this is a welcome development which will blunt the twin blades of hunger and food inflation while lifting growth in economies that rely heavily on agriculture.
Zambia is expected this season to reap a record harvest of the staple maize amounting to more than 3.6 million tonnes, more than double last year's stunted 1.5 million tonnes.
Other countries in the region, including South Africa, have also seen a rebound in the fields and yields. South Africa's maize crop this year is more than 14% higher.
The futures price for South African white maize – according to data compiled by Barchart – has fallen from record territory of more than R5,400 a tonne in January to about R4,700 a tonne, a drop of 13%. This in turn will contain retail prices for the caloric staple that many lower-income South African households depend on.
El Niño typically brings drought to southern Africa and the 2023/24 version was one of the strongest on record. But it was followed by a brief and weak La Niña which still delivered on its usual promise of good rains for the region.
The El Niño-Southern Oscillation (Enso), which dances to the beat of sea surface temperatures in the tropical eastern Pacific, is currently in the neutral phase between its polar extremes.
Most global forecasters currently see it remaining neutral until at least November, when there is a roughly 50/50 chance seen of La Niña making a return. Thankfully for this region, El Niño is not on the radar screen this year.
Such events are seen becoming more intense because of rapid climate change linked by the vast majority of scientists to fossil fuel use.
It must be said that the Hunger Hotspots report also contains plenty of ill tidings.
'The latest Hunger Hotspots report shows that Sudan, Palestine, South Sudan, Haiti and Mali are hotspots of highest concern, with communities already facing famine, at risk of famine or confronted with catastrophic levels of acute food insecurity due to intensifying or persisting conflict, economic shocks and natural hazards,' the report said.
And the Democratic Republic of Congo has been reintroduced to the hotspot list because of its intensifying conflicts.
'The devastating crises are being exacerbated by growing access constraints and critical funding shortfalls,' it pointedly noted – shortfalls that would include the Trump administration's wood-chipper approach to USAID. DM
What it means
Food inflation should cool in southern Africa and while the worst is over from last season's poor harvests, hunger has hardly been eliminated from a region with sky-high rates of poverty, unemployment and inequality. Still, there are grounds for regional optimism. Zambia, for example, is reaping a record maize harvest and there is no sign of an imminent return of El Niño.
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