Famine is looming in Somalia and intergovernmental organizations are preparing to respond. According to the World Food Programme of the United Nations (U.N.), about half of Somalia’s population is affected by the drought and a quarter of the population needs urgent assistance.

Somalia has faced a drought since August 2015. The U.N. announced a risk of near-future famine in Somalia in early February. The U.N. appealed for 864 million dollars to help more than three million people in Somalia, and the U.N. Food Programme has a 26 million dollar plan to respond to the drought. Currently, the World Food Programme offers rapid emergency response, nutritional meals and vocational training, among other crucial services to Somalia.

The U.N. is not the only major non-governmental organization concerned about the possibility of famine. The European Commission’s Joint Research Centre and the Famine Early Warning Systems Network created a report with the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization and the U.N. Food Programme to express risk of famine.

This is not the first time that Somalia has faced famine. When the country had a famine from 2011 to mid-2012, more than 250,000 people died. This famine resulted from a drought that began in October 2010. Philippe Lazzarini, the U.N. Humanitarian Coordinator for Somalia, said that more could have been done sooner to prevent these deaths. By the time the U.N. declared a famine based on the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, many people had already died.

In addition to the famine in Somalia, there are also looming famines in South Sudan, Nigeria and Yemen. There are more than 20 million people affected by food insecurity in all of these countries combined. The U.N. needs 4.4 billion dollars by March to address the problem and the World Food Program needs 1.2 billion dollars of those funds to aid these four countries for the next five months.

Early intervention is necessary to avert the famine in Somalia and in nearby countries.

– Jennifer Taggart

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