Ethiopia Humanitarian Needs Overview 2024 (February 2024)

Executive Summary: Humanitarian Needs and Key Figures

Despite noteworthy socio-economic growth over the past two decades, Ethiopia remains highly susceptible to climate driven shocks and has faced devastating conflict and continuing violence and insecurity in some areas of the country. A combination of rapid population growth and dependence on rain-fed agriculture leaves the economy and millions of Ethiopians acutely at risk from drought and other climate- induced shocks.

Ethiopia registered significant gains across multiple sectors. According to reporting from October 2015 , the country met six of the eight Millenium Development Goals (MDGs) “the proportion of people below the poverty line has been halved; the prevalence of hunger and undernourishment has been reduced; access to education has expanded; the gap in enrolment between boys and girls has narrowed; under-five mortality has been reduced by two-thirds; and similar progress was recorded in reducing HIV/AIDs, malaria, tuberculosis and other diseases.” These achievements were the result of sustained, massive investments and partnership between the Government of Ethiopia and international donors.

Improved social infrastructure and national disaster risk management systems enabled effective and robust response during past shocks. National systems served as a backbone for targeted humanitarian response when it was needed, particularly in the delivery of food, nutrition, health and water assistance. The Productive Safety Nets Program (PSNP) is another noteworthy nationally owned and internationally supported development investment, heralded as a flagship endeavour, allowing a shock-responsive approach to food insecurity for those with protracted needs and in times of crisis, serving some 8 million people.

These gains have however been challenged since 2019 as a result of the combined impact of COVID 19, backto-back climate shocks, conflicts and inter-communal violence as well as changes in national and global economic and political landscape.

In addition to recent reductions in development investments, the 2023 Humanitarian Response Plan was funded to at just 34 per cent, while the PSNP is also facing acute funding shortfalls.

The current multifaceted humanitarian crises are happening against a backdrop of significantly weakened and overwhelmed national disaster and social protection response capacity. Access to basic social services across Ethiopia has declined since 2020 due to natural and man-made crises, and decline in public budget allocated to social services, capital investment, social protection, and safety nets due to economic strains, exacerbating humanitarian needs and stretching limited resources. For example, access to sanitation declined from 11 per cent to 9 per cent. The education sector has seen a drop in general enrolment and 6.81 million children were out of school due to conflict, flood, and drought as of end 2023.

Ethiopia is facing another new and worsening food security crisis. El Niño weather conditions during the June – August (kiremt) rainy season affected rainfall patterns leading to a new drought in affected areas, including in Afar, Amhara, Tigray, Oromia, northern Somali and southern regions. The below-average rains and other factors have led to a poor harvest and water shortages, affecting millions of lives and livestock, triggering an alarming increase in food insecurity, malnutrition and disease outbreaks, also at a time when general food assistance was paused following reports of aid diversion. The kiremt (meher) harvest feeds some 75-80 per cent of the population. Many of the communities most affected are those that have yet to recover from the 2020-2022 northern Ethiopia conflict. According to FEWS NET, “households in northern Ethiopia increasingly face extreme hardships accessing food and income which are driving ongoing Emergency (IPC Phase 4) and Crisis (IPC Phase 3) outcomes. Households have limited food stocks resulting from the failure of the 2023 meher harvest, and income-earning activities have yet to recover from recent conflict. Additionally, in Afar, where livestock is a key food and income source, livestock herd sizes are low and livestock body conditions are poor due to drought. Ongoing food assistance continues to mitigate some of the most severe food consumption deficits among beneficiaries; however, assistance levels are insufficient for a large proportion of the population.

In Tigray, there is a risk of more extreme outcomes from February onward if food assistance is not scaled-up as planned and if social support does not continue.