The UN emergency food agency warns that Nearly six million people (about one in three Somalis) now suffer from acute hunger.including two million already experiencing emergency levels of food insecurity, just one step away from famine.
Around 1.9 million children suffer from acute malnutrition.
Hormuz factor
According to the WFP, The crisis is intensifying due to global economic shocks linked to instability in and around the Strait of Hormuz. and the broader Middle East crisis.
Food prices have increased by up to 70 percent in some areas of Somalia, while Fuel prices have increased by 150 percent.increasing the cost of transporting aid and basic goods.
Supply routes have also been disrupted, making humanitarian operations increasingly difficult as repeated droughts, conflict and displacement continue to devastate communities across the country.
Mr Hollingworth cited the example of containers of therapeutic food that were due to arrive in Somalia and that had been 40 days late “due to the impact on global shipping.”
Families leaving their homes
The senior official, speaking to journalists in Geneva, described the dire conditions across Somalia, particularly in Puntland, where dried-up water sources, collapsing livelihoods and successive failed rainy seasons are forcing families to flee in a desperate search for food and water.
“Somalia has suffered multiple failed rainy seasons – three in a row – which has Crops devastated, livestock wiped out, livelihoods eroded and millions affected of the people,” he said.
He recalled meeting families who had left everything behind after losing animals, farms and sources of income that could no longer support them.
Just a day earlier, in Mogadishu, he met a newly displaced family who had arrived in the capital after fleeing the south – one of thousands now seeking assistance in overcrowded urban areas.
Even recent rains have brought little relief to communities that have already exhausted their ability to cope, he warned.
Help response collapses
The WFP says humanitarian agencies are now being forced to make “impossible decisions” due to severe funding shortages.
The agency warned that it currently reaches only one in ten people who need food assistance, a dramatic drop from last year, when more than two million people received aid.
During his visit to Puntland, Mr Hollingworth visited a health center where mothers had walked hundreds of kilometers with malnourished children seeking treatment.
One mother told her that her three-year-old son had received only two months of nutritional support before the aid was cut because resources had been exhausted.
“Now she is forced to decide how she will feed her son and other children next month.“, said.
In the same region, the number of health centers in operation has fallen from 12 last year to just three today. Preventative nutrition programs have stopped completely at some facilities, leaving only emergency treatment available.
The WFP warned that without urgent new funding, its operations in Somalia could stop completely in July.
Echoes of fear of famine in 2022
Aid officials made stark comparisons to 2022, when Somalia came dangerously close to famine after a prolonged drought and mass displacement.
At that time, a large-scale international humanitarian response helped avert the catastrophe.
Hollingworth stressed that the same outcome is still possible now, but only if governments and donors act immediately.
“Famine can always be prevented,” he said. “Prevention depends on timely action.”
WFP says it already has the systems and infrastructure needed to rapidly scale up assistance, including 1.7 million biometrically registered people who could immediately receive emergency cash support.
But officials warned that without immediate international action, Somalia risks falling into another devastating humanitarian disaster.
“Hunger is increasing. Coping strategies are collapsing. And the window begins to close”Mr Hollingworth said.