GENEVA — United Nations aid agencies warn climate change is wreaking havoc throughout large parts of eastern and southern Africa, worsening the plight of millions of people struggling to survive conflict, poverty, hunger and disease.
Since mid-April, El Nino-related heavy rainfall has led to extreme weather events across East Africa, including flooding, landslides, violent winds and hail.
In Sudan
The U.N. refugee agency, UNHCR, reports climate-induced heavy rains and flooding have upended the lives of tens of thousands of people in war-torn Sudan this year, displacing, injuring and killing many.
The agency warns that heavy seasonal rains are creating further misery for thousands of displaced, including refugees in dire need of humanitarian aid.
UNHCR spokesperson Olga Sarrado told journalists in Geneva Friday that torrential rains and severe floods in the past two weeks are having a devastating effect on the lives of thousands of refugees and internally displaced, noting that more than 11,000 people in the eastern Kassala state are in desperate straits.
“They include many families who recently arrived after fleeing violence in Sennar state,” she said. “Some have been displaced three or four times already since the start of the conflict.
“They have lost their belongings, including food rations, and are facing significant challenges in accessing clean water and sanitation facilities, increasing the risk of waterborne diseases,” she said.
The International Organization for Migration reports that more than 10 million people have become displaced inside Sudan and 2 million have sought refuge in neighboring countries since mid-April 2023, when rival generals from Sudan’s Armed Forces and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces plunged Sudan into war.
The UNHCR reports Sudan continues to host about 1 million refugees and asylum seekers from other countries.
Sarrado said the UNHCR is prepositioning core relief items and shelter kits in the eastern and western parts of the country where more rainfall is expected. She added that flooding in the Darfur region is causing concern among aid agencies, as this will further limit their ability to reach thousands of destitute people.
“The humanitarian needs are reaching epic proportions in the region, as hundreds of thousands of civilians remain in harm’s way and famine has been recently confirmed in a displacement site, as you all know,” she said. “The conflict has already destroyed crops and disrupted livelihoods. The climate crisis is making those displaced even more vulnerable now.”
In Southern Africa
While the heavy rains continue to pound refugees and displaced communities in Sudan, the World Food Program reports that more than 27 million people across Southern Africa, devastated by an El-Nino-induced drought are going hungry.
“I have just returned from Zimbabwe and Lesotho, two of the worst-affected countries, where 50% and 34% of the countries’ respective populations are food insecure,” said Valerie Guarnieri, WFP assistant executive director, program operations.
Speaking from Rome, she said the drought sweeping across the region has decimated crops, causing food prices to spiral and triggering a hunger crisis at a time when their food stocks are at the lowest.
She noted that the onset of this year’s lean season, which is usually from October to March, has come early this year.
“People are facing an early and much deeper lean season,” she said, adding that the situation is likely to get worse, “given production shortfalls and dwindling supply.”
She said that 21 million children, 1 out of 3 in southern Africa, are stunted and 3.5 million children are struggling with acute malnutrition and require nutrition treatment.
“These numbers are not as stark as they are in other parts of the region. Countries that are facing famine — Sudan, for instance. However, we should not have these kind of numbers in Southern Africa,” she said.
“We know that to deal with stunting, to prevent wasting, we need to be ensuring that all children and all women of child-bearing age, in particular, have access to the nutrients that they require in order to grow and to thrive.”
To deal with this crisis, Guarnieri said WFP is scaling up its operation to provide emergency food and nutrition support to 5.9 million people in seven countries between now and March.
She said that WFP is facing a $320 million funding shortfall “that jeopardizes our ability to mount a response at the scale required.”
UNHCR’s Sarrado also expressed concern that her agency’s appeal for nearly $40 million to assist and protect 5.6 million refugees, returnees, internally displaced and local communities in Sudan and five countries of refuge “has so far received only $5 million in funds.”
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