WFP warns global food crisis will worsen in coming months

Davos, Switzerland, May 23 (EFE).- The world is heading towards a major food crisis and significant global pricing problems, the executive director for the United Nations World Food Programme, David Beasley, warned on Monday.

“What do you think is going to happen when you take a nation that normally grows enough food to feed 400 million people and you sideline that?” Beasely said during a panel discussion at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

The war in Ukraine was “devastating to global food security” and the world was in an “absolute crisis mode,” Beasely said.

“Over the next 10 to 12 months we are probably going to have a significant pricing problem, (…) and we very well may have a food availability problem,” he warned.

Beasely pointed out that the world was facing its worst humanitarian crisis since World War II, even before Russia invaded Ukraine nearly three months ago.

He said that current fertilizer shortages, droughts in Asia and lack of production in Ukraine and around the world were some of the factors leading to a global food crisis.

“We are taking food from the hungry to give to the starving,” he said, warning that the crisis would impact everybody, not just the world’s poorest.

Beasely added that it was “critical” for the Odesa port in Ukraine – which has been blockaded by Russia – to reopen and restore agricultural supply chains.

“It is absolutely critical because we will have famines around the world,” the WFP director warned.

Some 325 million around the world are currently facing acute food insecurity, according to Beasely.

Of those 325 million people, 49 million from 43 countries are at risk of famine, he added. EFE

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