Consider This from NPR - How The War In Ukraine Is Deepening The World's Hunger Crisis

Episode Date: April 20, 2022

The pains of every war ripple out beyond the borders of the conflict zone. And as the war between Russia and Ukraine drags on, the disruptions in the global food supply chain are beginning to deepen the already dire hunger crisis around the world. Ukraine and Russia combined export 30% of the world's wheat, in addition to other food supplies. Now, because of the ongoing war, the price of food worldwide is skyrocketing and 38 countries are facing acute food insecurity, meaning they are just one step from famine.NPR global health and development correspondent Nurith Aizenman reports on how the war is driving up prices. David Beasley, executive director of the UN World Food Programme, talks about how food insecurity looks inside of Ukraine, and what is to come for the rest of the world.In participating regions, you'll also hear a local news segment to help you make sense of what's going on in your community.Email us at [e-mail] more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Maya Tero and a group of volunteers wanted to do something to help mothers who were struggling with hunger in their country. It was last month, just before Mother's Day, in Lebanon. The volunteers decided to make baked goods. But, you know, this year, that proved to be really difficult. Finding flour was something really hard for us. Taro is the co-founder and executive director at Food Blessed, a food bank that helps marginalized groups in Lebanon. Either we were limited the amount of flour that we can purchase, or sometimes we would find flour, but the prices were crazy high.

And it wasn't just flour. Food supplies all over Lebanon are at record highs right now. Prices have risen by a thousand percent. I do not kid you when I tell you that we are receiving thousands of requests for food assistance on a weekly basis, sometimes on a daily basis. You could say that the majority of the Lebanese population is living on survival mode. And the dire food insecurity in Lebanon has a lot to do with a conflict happening far beyond that country's borders. It comes as no surprise that the repercussions of the war between Russia and Ukraine have led to catastrophic surges in the prices of certain food products. Lebanon relies heavily on essential food imports from both Russia and Ukraine.

And Lebanon is not alone in this. Yes, the war is bad news for all countries, but especially for poor countries and ones who are heavily import dependent like Lebanon. Yemen, Syria, South Sudan and Ethiopia are some of the 38 countries that currently face emergency levels of hunger, according to the United Nations World Food Program, meaning they are just one step away from famine. Frankly, I mean, I'm extremely worried. That's Arif Hussain, chief economist at the UN World Food Program. I think probably the worst thing is that this is coming during the time of COVID. A lot of people in many parts of the world have lost their jobs.

So you're getting squeezed from both sides. Consider this. Political turmoil, climate change, and the pandemic have left 276 million people worldwide in the midst of a hunger crisis. And now, Russia's war in Ukraine is disrupting the global food supply chain, making an already dire situation worse. — If we cannot assist them, they will die. That simple. real-time mid-market exchange rate with no hidden fees. Download the WISE app today or visit WISE.com. T's and C's apply. It's Consider This from NPR. Now, the pains of every war, of course, ripple out beyond the borders of the conflict zone. And as the war between Russia and Ukraine continues, hunger is beginning to affect more of the world. You see, Ukraine was dubbed the breadbasket for Eastern Europe during Soviet times. And then, when the Berlin Wall fell

at the end of the 1980s, Ukraine took on that role for even more of the globe. Ukraine is responsible for 10% of the entire world's wheat supply. Add in Russia, and that number jumps to 30 percent. These are very major suppliers, and to have them out of the world market means that world prices will rise. That's Joseph Glauber of the International Food Policy Research Institute. He says the war has driven up prices for essential products beyond wheat. Roughly around two-thirds of sunflower seed oil feed grains, so things like corn and barley. And to get a better sense of just how the war is driving up prices and disrupting the food supply chain worldwide, I spoke with my colleague Narit Eisenman.

She's NPR's global health and development correspondent. Okay, so what are the signs that you're seeing that show this war's already had an impact on global hunger? Well, it's hard to precisely parse the impact of the war specifically because it's hit in the midst of a whole bunch of other calamities that were already driving up food prices to record levels. A series of droughts in different parts of the world on top of the economic consequences of the pandemic, which had already cut into so many people's ability to pay for food. But that said, just in the last weeks, yes, this already bad situation has definitely gotten worse. The United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization tracks this food price index. And between February and March, it spiked by 12%, a giant leap to an all-time high. And so I spoke with Bob Kitchen. He's vice president of emergencies for the Aid Group International Rescue Committee. And I asked him, how has that price spike affected people?

Let's take a listen. We are seeing the number of people who are food insecure and in urgent need of food aid rising rapidly across at least four areas of the world that we're monitoring. So, yes, I think we're seeing alarming numbers right now. And where are the places where people seem the hardest hit? Well, it's the places that were already suffering and that just have had no buffer to absorb these price hikes. Afghanistan. A month ago, 55% of the population was facing crisis levels of food insecurity. Now it's gone up 10 points to 65%. We're talking families literally having to feed their kids every other day, every three days.

West Africa is also in a very dangerous state. Right now, 27 million people are going hungry there. But aid organizations predict by June, 11 million more people will fall into that status. And there's also a lot of hunger in Somalia, Kenya, and Ethiopia, where there's this incredible humanitarian crisis from the conflict in the Tigray region. This is devastating. What's the solution here? Is there even one? You know, Kitchen and others I spoke with say this can be solved with money. Even with the loss of food from Ukraine and Russia, there is still enough to feed people.

The issue is the way the reduced supply drives up prices. So basically cash is needed to help people cover their basic needs. The problem is that even before the war started, wealthy countries have not provided enough funding for food aid. And now there are signs that some countries are coming up with money to help Ukrainians by diverting it from their existing food aid programs. So it's not like there's more money being given because there's this additional crisis. It's the same pot of money. This week, the head of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, called out the global community in a very stark way. But even a fraction of it is not being given to Tigray, Yemen, Afghanistan, Syria, and the rest. A fraction. I don't know if the world really gives equal attention to black and white lives.

You know, he's saying, of course, the money for Ukraine and the attention is important, but he wants the world to come back to its senses and treat all lives equally. That was NPR global health and development correspondent Narit Eisenman. We've been talking about how the Russia-Ukraine war has worsened existing food insecurity in far-flung parts of the world. But the people still in Ukraine are going hungry, too. We're going to hear about that now from the executive director of the World Food Program, David Beasley. He spoke to my colleague Ari Shapiro last week from Kyiv, Ukraine. All right, let's start with where you are now in Ukraine and then zoom out.

Last year, Ukraine was the biggest provider of food by volume to your organization. 50% of the World Food Program's wheat came from Ukraine. And this is the season when farmers would ordinarily be planting. As you travel across the country, what are you seeing? Well, you're seeing devastation. Families torn apart from their communities and having to flee from harm's way. And everybody's very concerned about, number one, how are they going to feed the people inside Ukraine? Number two, how do you keep the economy afloat here? And number three, how do we make certain that we can get these very precious and critical food supplies to the millions, actually billions of people around the world that depend upon this Ukrainian food? Is the food even going to be there if farmers are not planting their fields because their fields have become a war zone? entire world. No doubt in my mind, the devastation that it will have on our operations could truly

lead to not just starvation, but destabilization of nations and mass migration. How does mass hunger and starvation lead to global destabilization and mass migration? When people don't have food, when they can't feed their little girl or their little boy, they're going to do whatever they got to do, including leaving home. And people don't want to leave home. I can tell you from experience that people will not leave their home if they have food and some degree of peace. But if they don't have both of those, they will do what any mom and dad in any place on the planet Earth would do. They're going to find that place where they can feed their family. You're painting a picture of a very dark future.

Let's talk about what could be done to avoid that. Obviously, it would help if the war in Ukraine ended. Obviously, it would help if climate change were addressed. If those two things are not addressed, are there steps the international community could take to avoid this worst-case scenario? Well, I had been saying all along, even before the Ukrainian war, if you can end these wars, we can end world hunger. We're facing a daunting task ahead of us, and it's going to require everybody working together, private sector, government sector, United Nations, NGOs, everyone willing to help out in ways they have not thought of before. That was the World Food Program's Executive Director, David Beasley. It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Elsa Chang.