Attachments
2. Rationale
2.1 Background
According to the latest IPC analysis in South Sudan – conducted in October 2024 – 47% of the population are expected to face severe acute food insecurity (IPC Phase-3+) between September and November 2024. Following a marginal improvement between December 2024 and March 2025, when the proportion of acutely food insecure households is expected to decrease to 45%, conditions are projected to worsen between April and July 2025, once harvested food stocks exhaust and financial access barriers reach their seasonal peak. During this period, 57% of the population are expected to face severe acute food insecurity, including 63,000 people in catastrophic hunger.
Between September and November 2024, Malakal is the only county in South Sudan where a pocket of catastrophic hunger (5% of the population) was reported at the area-level by the IPC. This is the first time that the IPC has reported a pocket of IPC Phase-5 in Malakal County. The situation has deteriorated significantly since 2023, despite notable improvements in perceptions of security, agricultural livelihoods, and households’ economic capacity, according to recent FSNMS data collected between July and August 2024. Furthermore, communities in Malakal did not encounter a significant shock in 2024: the proportion of households that were affected by insecurity and erratic weather declined compared to 2023, according to FSNMS data, while the percentage of households that were not affected by a single shock increased from 0% to 30%. Corroborating this, no major internal displacements were recorded in 2024, the number of recorded conflict-related fatalities decreased by 80%, and the maximum number of people exposed to flooding did not surpass 10,000 – as compared with a peak of 35,000 in 2023.
IPC analysis attributes the severity of the situation in Malakal to a considerable IDP and returnee burden. In August 2024, the CCCM Cluster identified 63,000 internally displaced persons in Malakal. Most reside in the Malakal Protection of Civilians (PoC) site administered by the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS), and receive Priority 1 food distributions. The remainder live in several informal sites and among the host community. Malakal also serves as a transit point for returnees fleeing the conflict in Sudan, intending to travel to areas of origin elsewhere in South Sudan. As of September 30th, IPC analysis identified 34,000 returnees in Malakal. Returnees most likely reside between Malakal Town, the Bulukat transit center and the host community, given restrictions on returnees’ entry to the Malakal PoC. However, recent data collected at the Bulukat transit center suggest the majority of returnees intend to leave Malakal, and most have already done so.2 Other factors that have contributed to an atypically severe food security situation in Malakal in 2024, according to IPC analysis, include poor agricultural output in 2023. Access to land and rates of planting fell by one-third from 2022; in turn, it is likely that household food stocks exhausted earlier. For example, FSNMS data reveal that households’ reliance on markets was atypically high throughout the 2024 lean season. This likely contributed to increasingly severe food security outcomes, given spiraling food prices as a result of dysfunctional supply chains – also identified as drivers of acute food insecurity during IPC analysis.
Between September and November 2024, 70% of the population in Malakal County are expected to face severe acute food insecurity. The situation will improve between December 2024 and March 2025, according to IPC analysis, when 65% of the population are expected to be acutely food insecure. This marginal improvement is attributed to the main harvest, an increased availability of fish and wild foods, improved market functionality, and an improved security situation. Between April and July 2025, conditions are projected to deteriorate. In this period, 75% of the population are expected to be acutely food insecure, including 10,000 people in IPC Phase-5 (“Catastrophe”).
It is possible that the food security situation will deteriorate before April 2025, for the following reasons:
- The IPC assumes that the harvest will mitigate acute levels of hunger between December 2024 and March 2025: FSNMS data suggest most households expected to harvest their sorghum (74%) and maize (86%) between September and October. However, crop production in Malakal is extremely low (production has not surpassed 6% of cereal needs since 2014). It is probable, then, that despite increased access to land and higher rates of planting in 2024, the poorest households will exhaust their food stocks in December/ early-2025. For example: access to land and rates of planting in 2022 were similar to those reported in 2024, however the harvest was sufficient to meet just 3% of cereal needs in Malakal in 2023.
- The IPC assumes that the availability of fish will increase and this will mitigate acute levels of hunger between December 2024 and March 2025: Access to fish was high at the time of FSNMS data collection (95%). However, just 42% of households reported consuming fish in the 24 hours prior to data collection. Furthermore, only 39% of households in IPC Phase-5 reported that they could access fish, according to cross-tabulation analysis. It is unlikely that this figure will increase significantly to mitigate IPC Phase-5 outcomes, for the following reasons: (1) 96% of households in Malakal do not own fishing equipment; (2) most households that access fish (53%) therefore rely on market purchases, which the poorest households with low economic capacity may struggle to afford on a regular basis.
- The IPC assumes that market functionality will increase and this will mitigate acute levels of hunger between December 2024 and March 2025: However, IPC analysis also assumes that market prices will continue to increase, and households’ economic capacity will not improve, during the first projection period, due mainly to import taxes, checkpoints, high transportation costs, an unfavourable exchange rate, and continued disruption to critical supply chains, including that caused by the Sudan crisis. Furthermore, a relative stabilization in food prices following the harvest is likely to be short-lived as a result of low crop production. Increased food prices will likely drive higher rates of acute food insecurity, especially once the poorest households exhaust their food stocks and begin to rely increasingly on market purchases in early-2025.
- The IPC assumes that humanitarian food assistance will mitigate acute levels of hunger between December 2024 and March 2025. Indeed, distribution plans for 2025 show a marked increase in the number of targeted recipients from 2024. However, disruption along key supply lines in 2024 eroded the mitigative impacts of humanitarian food distributions, according to data shared by a humanitarian partner. Similar challenges could drive an increased number of households in IPC Phases-4 and 5 in 2025, when the poorest households will likely rely heavily on food assistance. It is important, then, to anticipate and monitor these challenges.