PRIORITY NEEDS
After two years of incremental improvements, a mix of drought, insecurity, surging food prices, increasing malnutrition, access constraints and funding shortages have led to a serious deterioration of the humanitarian situation in Somalia.
- Deteriorating food security
Over 1 million people in Somalia are unable to meet their basic food requirements. This is up by an alarming 20 per cent since February 2014, according to the Food Security and Nutrition Analysis Unit (integrated phase classification (IPC), September 2014). Two thirds are internally displaced people, with approximately 80 per cent of them women and children. A further 2.1 million people are struggling to meet their minimum food requirements. This brings the total number of people in need of humanitarian assistance to 3.2 million.
- Emergency levels of acute malnutrition
One in seven children under the age of five--or 218,000 children--is estimated to be acutely malnourished. About 44,000 of them are severely malnourished and are at risk of death if they do not receive urgent medical treatment and therapeutic food. Three in four acutely malnourished children are in southern and central Somalia.
- Inadequate basic services
Poor basic services undermine the resilience of vulnerable people.
About 3.2 million women and men in Somalia need emergency health services, while 2.8 million women and men require improved access to water, sanitation and hygiene. The impact of this lack of basic services is felt most strongly among the internally displaced people who continue to be affected by cyclical disease outbreaks. Around 1.7 million children are out of school, and among those in school only 36 per cent are girls.
- Lack of protection
Over 1.1 million internally displaced people continue to face violations such as forced evictions, discrimination and gender-based violence (GBV). This includes more than 80,000 people temporarily displaced by military operations against Al Shabaab in 2014 alone in southern and central Somalia. These vulnerable communities need proper shelter, household items, protection and durable solutions.
Disclaimer
- UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
- To learn more about OCHA's activities, please visit https://www.unocha.org/.