Ambassador Kip Tom lend a hand helping unload critical food aid in Ganyiel & Katdolok On July 24, 2019.

An estimated six million people in the country will face acute food shortage from February to April, the government and three UN agencies have warned.

According to the integrated food security phase classification analysis conducted in January 2020, and released on Thursday, food insecurity continues to affect almost half of the population.

“51% of the population, will face crises IPC phase 3 or worse acute food insecurity, with about 20,000 of them in catastrophe IPC phase 5 found in Akobo and Duk of Jongeli State,” said Isaiah Chol, chairperson of the National Bureau of Statistics.

He attributes this to climate shocks, low crop production, insecurity and macro-economic crises.

Chol says the country’s cereal harvests in 2019 are also estimated to only cover 63 per cent of the country’s cereal needs in 2020.

He appealed for provision of humanitarian assistance to the affected populations.

For his part, the WFP Country Director described the food security situation in the country as dire.

Matthew Hollingworth partly blames severe flooding experienced in most parts of the country in 2019 for the inadequate food stocks.

“So peace is essential and at this juncture, we see the opportunities to build on those improvements of last year,” said Hollingworth, “but we have our work cut out first because there is still an enormous number of people in crises.”