As delivered
NEW YORK, 16 May 2025 - “Good afternoon. This year, for the first time, the Global Report on Food Crises devotes an entire chapter to acute malnutrition. This marks a turning point in how we understand the true scope of food crises. This goes far beyond just focusing on food insecurity but indeed – it is about the survival of the world’s most vulnerable children, their development, their futures, and a fundamental failure to uphold their most basic rights.
“In 2024, nearly 38 million children faced acute malnutrition, with over 10 million of them suffering the most life-threatening form – severe wasting. These numbers are more than just data points, they are sons and daughters, and a measure of how we are failing children living in the regions hardest hit by humanitarian crises. If these staggering numbers fail to resonate, perhaps the reality of what “malnutrition means for children will.
“So, 10 million children – extremely frail and significantly underweight for their height, often with visible emaciation of just skin and bones and minimal muscle mass. Those of us who have spent time in clinics and hospitals treating severe acute malnutrition will tell you, it is not the sound of infants crying that fills the air, but the silence of children and babies too weak to even cry.
“Severe acute malnutrition weakens their immune systems, making them highly susceptible to infections and diseases, and can impair brain development during those critical early years. The lifelong impact it leaves on children underscores the urgent need for action.
“Drivers of child wasting are complex and are an interplay of several factors, as my colleagues from WFP and FAO have already indicated. Often, families cannot afford nutritious, diverse food, or they face poor environmental conditions and lack access to health services. This is exacerbated by conflict, climate shocks, and economic instability, making it increasingly difficult to deliver essential nutrition and food to those who need it.
“But here is the truth: we know how to prevent and treat child wasting. The evidence and proven solutions are well established. The tools, like Ready-to-use-Therapeutic Food and community-based care, are cost-effective and can be provided, at scale, and further expertise is available to handle these cases in several of these contexts.
“What remains scarce is not capability, but political commitment and long-term financing. No child should die from a condition we know how to cure. Yet, every day we delay, lives are lost, not from lack of knowledge, but from lack of action.
“At UNICEF, we advocate for early, effective action to prevent wasting in children, even as we provide services for treatment. We also call for a greater focus on the nutritional needs of women. Last year, nearly 11 million pregnant and breastfeeding women were acutely malnourished. So... for some of the most vulnerable children, malnutrition starts when they’re in the womb.
“Acting early – before crises deepen – not only alleviates suffering for children, it saves money. The cost of treating a child suffering from malnutrition is 50 times higher than the cost of preventative care.
“Preventative care means we address the quality of children’s diets and correct the insufficient intake that is widespread in the countries highlighted in this report.
“Without urgent and sustained action, millions more children could fall into life-threatening malnutrition, and recovery from these setbacks may take a generation or longer.
“Warning systems are flashing.
“Now more than ever, we must protect continued investment in reliable information systems, robust data collection, and sustained humanitarian access - especially in hard-to-reach and conflict-affected areas. We must also prioritise predictable financing to scale up proven, life-saving solutions, while seizing opportunities to link humanitarian action with long-term development through stronger systems.
“This is not just a moral imperative, it is indeed a matter of survival. Failure to act decisively in 2025 will mean even graver consequences for children and women in 2026.
“I thank you for your attention.”
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Media contacts
Joe English
UNICEF New York
Tel: +1 917 893 0692
Email: jenglish@unicef.org
Nadia Samie-Jacobs
UNICEF New York
Tel: +1 845 760 2615
Email: nsamie@unicef.org
About UNICEF
UNICEF, the United Nations agency for children, works to protect the rights of every child, everywhere, especially the most disadvantaged children and in the toughest places to reach. Across more than 190 countries and territories, we do whatever it takes to help children survive, thrive, and fulfil their potential.