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It takes a lot to declare a famine.
Key points:
- South Sudan has declared a famine in parts of the country's south
- 100,000 people are at risk of starvation, and one million are on the brink of famine
- Civil war has raged in South Sudan, the world's newest nation, since 2013
If a population can't find enough food it's not strictly a famine. Nor is it famine if one third of the population is severely malnourished.
The United Nations' definition of famine is when three conditions coincide: at least 20 per cent of a population faces extreme food shortages, 30 per cent of people experience acute malnutrition, and at least two people per 10,000 die every day.
This week both the UN and the World Food Program agreed with South Sudan's decision to declare a state of famine in parts of the country's south.
Not since 2011 — when Somalia was in the midst of a severe drought — has a country been in famine, but the situation confronting South Sudan today is far worse.
Not only has it struggled with severe drought, but three years of civil war, a failed peace agreement, and now economic collapse have placed 100,000 people in the country's south at risk of starvation, and a further one million people on the brink of famine.
As with most disasters or conflicts, women and children make up a disproportionate number of those at risk of dying.
"People are just dispersing immediately without anything, certainly without the agriculture they have been harvesting," said James Elder a spokesman from UNICEF who has visited South Sudan many times.
"Sometimes a mother will run one way and a child will run the other under serious fire."
"Suddenly you've got people who are away from their food sources, and they're fleeing 50 to 100, 300 kilometres across the country into areas that may be barren and have no access to food and no access to water," he said.
Mothers walk for weeks to find food
Only a few years ago the world had high hopes for the future of South Sudan when it became the world's newest nation in 2011.
South Sudanese refugees around the world — including many in Australia — returned home in the hope of seeing their young country prosper. But it wasn't to be.
Civil war broke out in 2013 after President Salva Kii sacked his deputy. What began as a political conflict spilled into ethnic fighting which has since spread through much of the country.
Tens of thousands have died, at least three million people have been forced from their homes, and many are now living in UN refugee camps around the country. One and a half million have fled across the border to neighbouring countries.
How can Australians help?
- UNICEF is running an appeal to help children survive the famine
- Donations can be made by Credit Card or PayPal
- The money goes towards emergency therapeutic food and supplies
The war and displacement have prevented farmers from planting or harvesting crops. The severe food shortage has fuelled hyperinflation — which reached 800 per cent last year — which in turn has priced imported foods beyond the reach of many South Sudanese.
Nyakena, 25, was pregnant with twins when war came to her home in South Sudan. At 2:00am one night she awoke to the sound of gunfire. The entire village of Bor, in the country's south, was ablaze.
As the shooting came closer she and other villagers fled. Nyakena ran for two hours straight fearing for the safety of her unborn children.
She left her husband behind. His parents were killed in the fighting and, enraged, he went into the bush to try to avenge their deaths. She hasn't seen him since.
Nyakena gave birth in a refugee shelter, then left for the capital Juba to find her brother. But without a ration card she found it difficult to get food and feed her new twins.
They became thinner and thinner, and ended up in a clinic with malnutrition.
Nyakena and her children are now safe. But Mr Elder said he knows of mothers who have walked for weeks trying to find food for their children, only to watch them die.
"They've lived off grass or lilies or bulbs, and they've finally reached safety somewhere but it's too late," he said.
"She gets to a clinic but within 24 hours she watches her child die."
'We can turn it around'
The brutal violence has also prevented humanitarian agencies from supplying food to those in desperate need.
"Humanitarian agencies have been struggling to access those two parts of South Sudan for years in order to be able to get food and other kinds of humanitarian assistance to people," said Challis McDonough at the World Food Programme.
"If we had access to those areas, we could have kept this from happening."
"If we get better access now, we can turn it around, we can keep the famine from spreading to new areas and we can keep it from intensifying where it is."
At least one million people are now on the brink of famine in the two worst hit counties in southern Unity State. Another five million South Sudanese are expected to become 'food insecure' by April.
"This is currently the largest refugee crisis in Africa and the third largest in the world and there is complete lack of international attention on this crisis that is unfolding," says Jesse Kamstra from the Lutheran World Federation.
"I don't know how many more thousands have to come and flee or die before the international community wakes up and realises what is happening here on the ground."
Fears crisis could eclipse previous famines
The United Nations blames the South Sudanese Government for the humanitarian crisis.
"Food insecurity … is largely because of the conflict, is largely because of the insecurity, is largely because the access challenges humanitarians have periodically had, its also because of attacks on humanitarian workers and also the looting of humanitarian assets," said Eugene Owuso, the UN Humanitarian Co-ordinator.
Mr Elder said if the war did not stop, the famine in South Sudan would be the worst famine in years.
"When we talk about 100,000 people in famine, and another million on the brink, these are crazy numbers. But they're human faces," he said.
"Helicopters drop food and you see literally tens of thousands of people come out of the bush seeking support. If we can keep doing that we will avoid those figures.
"But given there are one million on the brink of famine, that could eclipse what we saw in Somalia six years ago."
He has urged the South Sudanese Government and other warring parties to respect a peace agreement signed in 2015, which collapsed last year.
"There's a peace accord in place that all parties to the conflict have signed, and they need to follow through with that. I think there remains a chance in South Sudan that if all parties in the highest offices of power — government and pposition — followed through with that then peace again can take hold".
Topics: unrest-conflict-and-war, famine, relief-and-aid-organisations, south-sudan
First posted