WFP calls for urgent, safe access to millions in Sudan

February 4, 2024 (PORT SUDAN) – The World Food Programme (WFP) has urgently called on Sudan’s warring parties to provide immediate guarantees for the safe and unimpeded delivery of humanitarian food assistance to conflict-hit locations.

The agency said millions, especially across conflict lines where hungry displaced civilians are trapped and cut-off from life-saving humanitarian assistance.

“The situation in Sudan is dire. Despite WFP’s efforts to provide food assistance to millions of people across the country since the war broke out, almost 18 million individuals across the country are currently facing acute hunger (IPC3+),” it said.

WFP warned of a looming hunger catastrophe in Sudan and said people must be able to access aid immediately to prevent a crisis from becoming a catastrophe.

Shockingly, the number of hungry has more than doubled from a year ago, and an estimated five million people are experiencing emergency levels of hunger (IPC phase 4) due to conflict in areas such as Khartoum, Darfur, and Kordofan.

“The situation in Sudan today is nothing short of catastrophic. Millions of people are impacted by the conflict. WFP has food in Sudan, but lack of humanitarian access and other unnecessary hurdles are slowing operations and preventing us from getting vital aid to the people who most urgently need our support,” said Eddie Rowe, WFP Sudan Representative and Country Director in Sudan.

WFP is the logistics backbone of the humanitarian response in Sudan and has ramped up lifesaving assistance in response to the deepening crisis, assisting over 6.5 million people since the war broke out, the agency noted in a statement.

To reach families in Darfur, WFP established a cross-border route from Chad, through which over 1 million people have received food assistance. Other agencies have also used the route to deliver other much needed support.

However, WFP is currently only able to regularly deliver food assistance to 1 in 10 people facing emergency levels of hunger (IPC phase 4) in Sudan. These people are trapped in conflict hotspots, including Khartoum, Darfur, Kordofan, and now Gezira, and for assistance to reach them humanitarian convoys must be allowed to cross the frontlines. Yet it is becoming nearly impossible for aid agencies to cross due to security threats, enforced roadblocks, and demands for fees and taxation.

A vital humanitarian hub in Gezira state – which previously supported over 800,000 people a month – was engulfed by fighting in December and a key WFP warehouse looted. WFP is trying to obtain security guarantees to resume operations in the area to reach vulnerable families who are now trapped and in urgent need of food assistance.

“Every single one our trucks need to be on the road each and every day delivering food to the Sudanese people, who are traumatised and overwhelmed after over nine months of horrifying conflict. Yet life-saving assistance is not reaching those who need it the most, and we are already receiving reports of people dying of starvation,” noted Rowe.

“Both parties to this gruesome conflict must look beyond the battlefield and allow aid organisations operate. For that, we need the uninhibited freedom of movement, including across conflict lines, to help people who so desperately need it right now, regardless of where they are,” he warned.

Nearly 8 million people have been forced from their homes in Sudan since April 2023, the United Nations says, calling for urgent additional support to cope with the crisis.

(ST)