South Sudan: ICRC Raises Food-shortage Concerns

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has revealed life-threatening food shortages in South Sudan.

The humanitarian organisation, in its latest assessment report, said communities in nine out of the ten states in South Sudan harvested on average 50 percent less cereal and vegetables in 2020 than they did in 2019.

It is understood that food production declined due to the cumulative impact of conflict, armed violence and natural disasters.

‘People are tired of depending on aid. They want to live in dignity and provide for themselves and their families’, Director General of the ICRC, Robert Mardini, said during his visit to the country.

‘Our assessment shows that climate shocks, combined with continuing conflict and armed violence, make the transition for communities from receiving food assistance to independent food production extremely difficult’.

More than 1.4 million South Sudanese are displaced inside the country, with many seeking refuge in neighbouring countries, according to a report by Cooperative for Assistance and Relief Everywhere (CARE).

The years-long civil war has contributed to an economic crisis and below-average harvest that continues to send food prices skyrocketing.

The result has been a food crisis that has seen 9,000 people losing access to food every day.

‘The Covid-19 pandemic is a crisis on top of a very fragile situation. It is not the main concern of many communities already facing multiple hardships, often over years or decades’, Mardini said.

‘Whilst we have adapted our humanitarian action to include Covid-19 preventive measures, the pandemic has deepened existing vulnerabilities especially in the health care system, which has been weakened or destroyed by decades of conflict and armed violence’.

Sources: ICRC CARE

Photo source: ICRC

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