International agencies are sounding the alarm louder: there is hunger emergency not only in South Sudan but also in Nigeria, Somalia and Yemen.
The United Nations officially declares “famine” only when a population reaches certain death rate, malnutrition, and food shortage thresholds.
Famine is triggered by mainly conflicts and droughts. But the UN has repeatedly emphasized that modern-day famines are man-made — without proper attention to strong health, food, and economic-development systems in a country, drought becomes a shock too great to bear.
Warnings of famine have largely been ignored in Nigeria. The area most threatened is the north-east where Boko Haram has driven over 2million people into IDP camps.
