What is the impact of conflict on hunger?

The main factors behind food insecurity and malnutrition are conflict, extreme climate phenomena, economic shocks and inequalities. 

Intensification of these factors has brought about an alarming increase in hunger since 2016. In 2021, 828 million people suffered from hunger or malnutrition. Among these people, 139 million were in countries where a conflict was taking place, and conflict was the main cause of their hunger.  

The alarming resurgence in world hunger goes hand in hand with the upsurge in armed conflict and flagrant disregard for international humanitarian law, the main victim of which is the civilian population. The war in Ukraine has been added to a long list of conflicts, including prolonged conflicts, which lead to unfulfilled needs. A political solution to them has yet to be found.   

How and why does conflict cause hunger?  

The number of conflicts ongoing is on the rise, and on all continents, they are becoming longer and increasingly complex. Their consequences on communities, exacerbated by climate shocks, have serious consequences on food security and are one of the causes of the increase in food insecurity, severe food crises and famines across the world.  

In 2021, almost 70% of the people experiencing a food crisis or famine lived in 10 countries: Democratic Republic of the Congo, Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Yemen, northern Nigeria, Syria, Sudan, South Sudan, Pakistan and Haiti. Conflict and violence were the leading factor in seven of these food crises. Somalia, Yemen, Afghanistan and South Sudan are the hardest-hit countries: almost 500,000 people there live in conditions close to famine.  

Burkina Faso: almost 2 million people displaced

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One of the ways conflicts cause hunger is through population displacement (including displacement of farmers), which plunges communities into poverty. It also puts the brakes on agricultural production, destroys assets and ruins food stocks. Furthermore, it disrupts markets as it raises prices and harms people’s livelihoods.   

In many countries, hunger is used as a weapon of war. Blocking aid to populations, destroying drinking water infrastructures and plundering food resources (or attacking markets) are tactics used today that are rarely condemned. 

Without serious political commitment and immediate access, needs will continue to increase across the world. Humanitarian organisations’ activities are becoming more and more constrained, either by the combatants or by the states and donors that enact laws or measures or implement international sanctions. These sanctions limit humanitarian organisations’ ability to react and have a direct impact on communities.  

Humanitarian access in conflict zones   

The worsening and acceleration of crises has taken populations’ vulnerability and exposure to new heights. Ensuring access to a humanitarian response and services based on the principles of neutrality, impartiality and independence remains a challenge in most of the countries where Action contre la Faim operates, while in certain countries, hunger is used as a war tactic, but rarely condemned.  

Meanwhile, the humanitarian space continues to shrink, international humanitarian law is being violated repeatedly, and humanitarian principles are being challenged on a regular basis. Attacks against humanitarian workers are becoming more common and going unpunished, while the politicisation of aid given to NGOs from states is an obstacle to the assistance’s effectiveness and efficiency, while constituting a major risk to operations, to emergency deployment and to humanitarian staff.   

Aid agencies call for upholding international humanitarian law, protection of civilians and civilian objects in Ukraine

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How can we end this vicious circle?   

To break the circle, Action contre la Faim calls upon policy decision-makers to consider hunger a consequence, cause and potential driver of conflict, by working on the deep causes of hunger in conflict situations and striving to remove the main obstacles to humanitarian interventions.    

• States must tangibly implement resolution 2417 of the United Nations Security Council, which condemns the use of hunger as a weapon of war and calls for access and humanitarian aid to be facilitated in all zones of conflict.   

• Leaders must intensify diplomatic efforts to prevent humanitarian crises linked to conflict in the most effective way. They must invest in conflict prevention and peace consolidation and strengthen early alert systems that pre-empt humanitarian risks connected to emerging conflicts.   

• In the countries most vulnerable to food insecurity, pre-emptive, preventive humanitarian aid responses must be immediate. Aid must be increased for existing food crises and action must be taken quickly to deal with deteriorating situations on a local level if a new hunger spiral is to be averted.  

• In all zones of conflict, Action contre la Faim calls upon combatants to cease indiscriminate attacks on civilians and infrastructures essential for them to survive. Leaders must initiate diplomatic efforts to put an end to current hostilities and respond to their disastrous humanitarian consequences, at the very moment when humanitarian access is being hindered by conflict and violence.   

Sources : 2022 Global Report on Food Crises / SOFI 2022