Two-thirds of global hunger is concentrated in 10 conflict-torn countries

That 2026 Global Report on the Food Crisisreleased on Friday by an alliance of UN agencies, the European Union (EU) and partners, found this 266 million people in 47 countries will experience high levels of acute food insecurity by 2025 – almost a quarter of the population analyzed and almost double the number recorded in 2016.

This report paints a clear picture: hunger is no longer a short-term emergency, but a persistent and increasingly concentrated global challenge.

“Today’s acute food insecurity is not only widespread – it is persistent and recurrent,” said Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (F.A.O) Director General Qu Dongyu, warned that this crisis is structural and not temporary.

Conflict with the main driver

Conflict remains the main cause and causes more than half of the people to face severe hunger.

Ten countries – Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Democratic Republic of Congo, Myanmar, Nigeria, Pakistan, South Sudan, Sudan, Syrian Arab Republic and Yemen – accounting for two-thirds of their entire population are facing high levels of acute hunger.

At the extreme end, famine occurs in 2025 in Gaza and parts of Sudan – the first time since this report began that there have been two separate famines in one year.

“This report is a call to action,” the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said in the foreword, “to galvanize the political will to urgently increase investment in life-saving aid, and work to end a conflict that is causing so much suffering for so many people..”

This report also highlights a a sharp increase in the severity of hunger. More than 39 million people in 32 countries face emergency levels of food insecurity, while the number of people experiencing hunger has increased ninefold since 2016.

It is the children who bear the greatest burden

Children are among those most affected. In 2025, 35.5 million children suffer from acute malnutrition, including nearly 10 million children suffering from severe acute malnutrition – a life-threatening condition that dramatically increases the risk of death.

“Children with severe wasting are too thin for their height. Their immune systems are weakened so that common childhood illnesses can be fatal,” UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) spokesman Ricardo Pires warned.

In the worst-affected regions – including Gaza, Myanmar, South Sudan and Sudan – overlapping crises of conflict, disease and limited access to health services are causing extreme levels of malnutrition and increasing the risk of death.

Displacement exacerbates the crisis

Forced displacement exacerbates this crisis.

More than 85 million people became refugees in the context of a food crisis last year, and refugee populations consistently face higher levels of hunger than host communities.

“Forced displacement and food insecurity are closely linked, forming a vicious circle,” said The UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Barham Salih, warned that humanitarian aid alone was not enough to break the pattern.

Myanmar is a country with a very high population suffering from acute food insecurity. Pictured here, a family in a refugee camp in the east of the country.

Collapse of funding

Despite the scale of the crisis, the report warns that funding is moving in the opposite direction.

Humanity and development funding for the food and nutrition response has fallen back to levels last seen almost a decade agolimiting the ability of governments and aid organizations to respond effectively.

At the same time, data gaps are growing. The number of countries capable of producing reliable food security assessments has fallen to its lowest level in the past decade, meaning the true scale of hunger may be greater than currently estimated.

The outlook is gloomy for 2026

Looking ahead, the outlook for 2026 remains bleak. Ongoing conflicts, climate shocks and economic instability are expected to continue food insecurity at critical levels in many countries.

The report also highlights new risks associated with global market disruption, including risks stemming from the ongoing crisis in the Middle East, which could further increase food prices and strain supply chains.

Aid agencies warn that without a change in approach, the world risks being trapped in a cycle of increasingly severe crises, with hunger no longer a temporary emergency but increasingly a feature of global instability.

“We must shift from reacting late to acting early, and from relying solely on food aid to protecting local food production – because that is how we reduce need, save lives, and build resilience over time.” said FAO Director General Qu.