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A great video on why hunger is still a huge problem and how it can be solved.  It talks about some countries having too much food and some countries almost no food.

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This article talks about GMO's (Genetically Modified Organisms) and how they could solve world hunger. Scientists are currently trying to make food items that can grow in these areas where hunger is prevalent but also make it so the food is nutritious enough to last long.

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GMOs, genetically modified organisms, have gotten a lot of shame recently because of the mass crusade against them. Pictures of foods with syringes in them are often portrayed to scare us into the organic lifestyle, one that is becoming increasingly popular. I however, believe that there is nothing wrong with GMOs, and believe they can be used to help solve the problem of world hunger.

There are still 1.02 billion people who live in a near-starvation level in the world. An estimated 26% of the world is said to be starving and there are over 4 million deaths a year due to starvation according to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). This is of course, a huge problem, and one that cannot be left alone.

GMOs can be used to help this problem by producing higher quantities of food that last longer. This solves the problem of food drives, which rely entirely on the goodness of people and only feed populations for a short period of time. With GMO agriculture introduced, the population will be able to have access to a food supply for their lifetime because plants are able to be replanted and grown.

All efforts of GMO scientists have been focused on trying to prove to the public that GMOs are safe to consume. This shouldn't be their main focus, but it is forced to be because nobody trusts the somewhat "sketchy" food supply. This crusade against GMOs is what is delaying the further research into the good uses of GMOs. While we are debating over whether GMOs are healthy or not, people in Third World countries are dying of starvation.

One thing that we as Americans must realize is that we have been using GMO crops for ages; ever since the 1600's actually! Corn, watermelon, bananas and even broccoli, are all GMOs that we readily consume daily. These crops are healthy for consumption and are highly regulated by the FDA, Food and Drug Administration, meaning that they have passed the food tests.

The actual process of genetically modifying an organism is also extremely natural. Mutations in our DNA happen very often, and one will probably experience close to one million mutations in his/her lifetime. This very same process of mutations is what is occurring in GMOs, so it isn't as unnatural as you may have first believed.

Another reason for the safety and success for GMOs is the fact that 88% of scientists that study GMOs say they are safe to consume. This however, isn't the case for the public as only 37% of people think they are safe to eat. Why is there a huge divide between uneducated people and scientists that spend their whole lifetime studying these organisms?

This division is in fact caused by a distrust in scientists, and was explained thoroughly in my earlier article, Why science communication isn't effective. The public unfortunately, doesn't trust scientists because of various factors such as lack of knowledge and understanding of what they do.

There is definitely a reason that GMOs are so widely supported by scientists and that reason is because it is a solution to so many problems. GMOs allow farmers to harvest more crops in a smaller area, which defeats the main negative effect of farming, which is habitat loss. Farmland covers 38% already of the world's landmass, and any increase in this number will continue to destroy habitats and biodiversity. Producing more food without GMOs would result in a catastrophic biodiversity loss.

GMOs can and will be the means of solving world hunger. An increase in the food supply of Third World countries will lead to more affluence. This affluence will lead to lower birth rates and death rates, so those countries once exponentially adding onto our global population, will stabilize. This stabilization is what will solve the problem of hunger, but the GMOs are the kickstarters to get to that point.

-Benjamin Minch

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GMOs, genetically modified organisms, have gotten a lot of shame recently because of the mass crusade against them. Pictures of foods with syringes in them are often portrayed to scare us into the organic lifestyle, one that is becoming increasingly popular. I however, believe that there is nothing wrong with GMOs, and believe they can...

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More information on world hunger and how many people it affects. This article gives a lot of statistics that may help us understand more about the problem of world hunger.

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Every day too many men and women across the globe struggle to feed their children a nutritious meal. In a world where we produce enough food to feed everyone, 821 million people - one in nine - still go to bed on an empty stomach each night. Even more - one in three - suffer from some form of malnutrition.

Eradicating hunger and malnutrition is one of the great challenges of our time. Not only do the consequences of not enough - or the wrong - food cause suffering and poor health, they also slow progress in many other areas of development like education and employment.
In 2015 the global community adopted the 17 Global Goals for Sustainable Development to improve people's lives by 2030. Goal 2 - Zero Hunger - pledges to end hunger, achieve food security, improve nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture, and is the priority of the World Food Programme.

Every day, WFP and its partners work to bring us closer to a zero hunger world. With our humanitarian food assistance, we provide nutritious food to those in urgent need. Meanwhile our complementary programmes address the root causes of hunger, building the resilience of communities, so we don't need to keep saving the same lives each year.
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The world has made great progress in reducing hunger: There are 216 million fewer hungry people than in 1990-92, despite a 1.9 billion increase in the world's population. But there is still a long way to go, and no one organization can achieve Zero Hunger if it works alone. If we want to see a world free of hunger by 2030, governments, citizens, civil society organizations and the private sector must collaborate to invest, innovate and create lasting solutions.

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Every day too many men and women across the globe struggle to feed their children a nutritious meal. In a world where we produce enough food to feed everyone, 821 million people - one in nine - still go to bed on an empty stomach each night.

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Great ways listed to reduce the amount of food waste going on in your family. Helps stay organized and save money as well!

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Most people don't realize how much food they throw away every day - from uneaten leftovers to spoiled produce to parts of fruits and vegetables that could be eaten or repurposed.

One-third of all food in the United States goes uneaten. EPA estimates that in 2019, about 96 percent of households' wasted food ended up in landfills, combustion facilities, or down the drain to the sewer system. The remainder was composted.

Preventing food from going to waste is one of the easiest and most powerful actions you can take to save money and lower your climate change footprint by reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and conserving natural resources.
On this page:

Save money by buying only what you need, eating what you buy, and avoiding throwing away food. The average family of four spends $1,500 each year on food that ends up uneaten.

Reduce your environmental and climate change footprint.

Conserve resources and energy. When food is wasted, the land, water, energy, and other inputs that are used in producing, processing, transporting, preparing, storing, and disposing the food are wasted as well.

More than 85 percent of GHG emissions from landfilled food waste result from activities prior to food entering a landfill, including the production, transport, processing, and distribution of food. Plus, when food decomposes in a landfill, methane, a potent greenhouse gas, is emitted-and food is the single largest category of material placed in municipal landfills third-largest source of human-related methane emissions in the United States

Ways to Prevent Wasted Food at Home

Planning, prepping, and storing food can help your household waste less food. Below are some tips to help you do just that:

Making a list with weekly meals in mind can save you money and time. If you only buy what you expect to use, you will be more likely to keep it fresh and use it all.

Keep a running list of meals and their ingredients that your household already enjoys - that way, you can easily choose, shop for, and prepare meals that you are likely to consume.

Look in your refrigerator, freezer, and pantry first to avoid buying food you already have. Make a list each week of what needs to be used up and plan upcoming meals around it.

Plan your meals for the week before you go shopping and buy only the things needed for those meals.

Make your shopping list based on how many meals you'll eat at home. Consider how often you will eat out, if you plan to eat frozen precooked meals, and if you will eat leftovers for any of your meals.

Include quantities on your shopping list noting how many meals you'll make with each item to avoid overbuying. For example: "salad greens - enough for two lunches".

Buying in large quantities (e.g., buy one, get one free deals) only saves money if you use all the food before it spoils.

Buying food from bulk bins can save you money and reduce food waste and packaging as you can purchase the amount of food you need as opposed to a pre-determined amount. When buying in bulk, remember to store food properly in airtight, labeled containers.

Purchase imperfect produce or upcycled products. Imperfect produce may have physical imperfections but is just as safe and nutritious and can sometimes be found at discounted prices. Upcycled products are made from ingredients that might have otherwise gone to waste.

Toolkit for Your Home and Your Community

The Food: Too Good to Waste Toolkit will help you figure out how much food is really going to waste in your home and what you can do to waste less. By making small shifts in how you shop for, prepare, and store food, you can save time and money. It can also keep the valuable resources used to produce and distribute food from going to waste!

Food: Too Good to Waste also contains an Implementation Guide that is designed to teach local governments and community organizations how to implement a Food: Too Good to Waste campaign in their community using the Toolkit.

If You Can't Reduce Wasted Food, Divert It From Landfills

Resources

U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA):
Information for Consumers
Infographic- Easy Steps to Prevent Food Waste ( English, Chinese, Spanish)
Video - Tips to Reduce Food Waste at Home
Video- Plan Ahead to Reduce Food Waste ( English, Spanish)

Video- Serve Smart to Reduce Food Waste ( English, Spanish)

Video- Love Your Leftovers to Reduce Food Waste ( English, Spanish)
MyPlate- Meal Planning Refrigeration and Food Safety FoodKeeper App
U.S. Food and Drug Administration(FDA):
How to Cut Food Waste and Maintain Food Safety
Date Labels on Packaged Foods & Infographic

Tips to Reduce Food Waste (including three infographics)
Food Waste Facts Infographic Animated Videos with Information on:

Tips to reduce food waste

Understanding date labels on packaged foods

The impact of food waste

Imperfect produce

Sources

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Most people don't realize how much food they throw away every day - from uneaten leftovers to spoiled produce to parts of fruits and vegetables that could be eaten or repurposed. One-third of all food in the United States goes uneaten.

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The national organization, "No kid hungry"  is devoted to make it so all kids in the United States will not deal with hunger. They look at communites to see problems with the issue, then, they fix it.

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No Kid Hungry is working to end child hunger in America today by ensuring that all children get the healthy food they need every day to thrive.

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An organization whose goal is to make a society where hunger is not a cause of death. They would like to mobilize the resources necessary to stop hunger by 2030 especially in the most needed places.

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Rise Against Hunger is growing a global movement to end hunger by empowering communities, nourishing lives and responding to emergencies. Join our team as we connect communities across the globe to support stories of hope and healing. Learn more about What Drives Us. Grassroots Relationships, Global Reach

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This article shows that hunger isn't something that only happens in foreign countries, it also happens here in America. It talks about three areas here in America that are facing this problem.

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Millions of working Americans don't know where their next meal is coming from. We sent three photographers to explore hunger in three very different parts of the United States, each giving different faces to the same statistic: One-sixth of Americans don't have enough food to eat.

Osage, Iowa

Hunger in
the Land of Cars

Houston, Texas

Hunger in
the City of Plenty

Bronx, New York

On a gold-gray morning in Mitchell County, Iowa, Christina Dreier sends her son, Keagan, to school without breakfast. He is three years old, barrel-chested, and stubborn, and usually refuses to eat the free meal he qualifies for at preschool. Faced with a dwindling pantry, Dreier has decided to try some tough love: If she sends Keagan to school hungry, maybe he'll eat the free breakfast, which will leave more food at home for lunch.

Dreier knows her gambit might backfire, and it does. Keagan ignores the school breakfast on offer and is so hungry by lunchtime that Dreier picks through the dregs of her freezer in hopes of filling him and his little sister up. She shakes the last seven chicken nuggets onto a battered baking sheet, adds the remnants of a bag of Tater Tots and a couple of hot dogs from the fridge, and slides it all into the oven. She's gone through most of the food she got last week from a local food pantry; her own lunch will be the bits of potato left on the kids' plates. "I eat lunch if there's enough," she says. "But the kids are the most important. They have to eat first."

The fear of being unable to feed her children hangs over Dreier's days. She and her husband, Jim, pit one bill against the next-the phone against the rent against the heat against the gas-trying always to set aside money to make up for what they can't get from the food pantry or with their food stamps, issued by the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). Congressional cuts to SNAP last fall of five billion dollars pared her benefits from $205 to $172 a month.

On this particular afternoon Dreier is worried about the family van, which is on the brink of repossession. She and Jim need to open a new bank account so they can make automatic payments instead of scrambling to pay in cash. But that will happen only if Jim finishes work early. It's peak harvest time, and he often works until eight at night, applying pesticides on commercial farms for $14 an hour. Running the errand would mean forgoing overtime pay that could go for groceries.

It's the same every month, Dreier says. Bills go unpaid because, when push comes to shove, food wins out. "We have to eat, you know," she says, only the slightest hint of resignation in her voice. "We can't starve."

Chances are good that if you picture what hunger looks like, you don't summon an image of someone like Christina Dreier: white, married, clothed, and housed, even a bit overweight. The image of hunger in America today differs markedly from Depression-era images of the gaunt-faced unemployed scavenging for food on urban streets. "This is not your grandmother's hunger," says Janet Poppendieck, a sociologist at the City University of New York. "Today more working people and their families are hungry because wages have declined."

In the United States more than half of hungry households are white, and two-thirds of those with children have at least one working adult-typically in a full-time job. With this new image comes a new lexicon: In 2006 the U.S. government replaced "hunger" with the term "food insecure" to describe any household where, sometime during the previous year, people didn't have enough food to eat. By whatever name, the number of people going hungry has grown dramatically in the U.S., increasing to 48 million by 2012-a fivefold jump since the late 1960s, including an increase of 57 percent since the late 1990s. Privately run programs like food pantries and soup kitchens have mushroomed too. In 1980 there were a few hundred emergency food programs across the country; today there are 50,000. Finding food has become a central worry for millions of Americans. One in six reports running out of food at least once a year. In many European countries, by contrast, the number is closer to one in 20.

To witness hunger in America today is to enter a twilight zone where refrigerators are so frequently bare of all but mustard and ketchup that it provokes no remark, inspires no embarrassment. Here dinners are cooked using macaroni-and-cheese mixes and other processed ingredients from food pantries, and fresh fruits and vegetables are eaten only in the first days after the SNAP payment arrives. Here you'll meet hungry farmhands and retired schoolteachers, hungry families who are in the U.S. without papers and hungry families whose histories stretch back to the Mayflower. Here pocketing food from work and skipping meals to make food stretch are so common that such practices barely register as a way of coping with hunger and are simply a way of life.

It can be tempting to ask families receiving food assistance, If you're really hungry, then how can you be-as many of them are-overweight? The answer is "this paradox that hunger and obesity are two sides of the same coin," says Melissa Boteach, vice president of the Poverty and Prosperity Program of the Center for American Progress, "people making trade-offs between food that's filling but not nutritious and may actually contribute to obesity." For many of the hungry in America, the extra pounds that result from a poor diet are collateral damage-an unintended side effect of hunger itself.

As the face of hunger has changed, so has its address. The town of Spring, Texas, is where ranchland meets Houston's sprawl, a suburb of curving streets and shade trees and privacy fences. The suburbs are the home of the American dream, but they are also a place where poverty is on the rise. As urban housing has gotten more expensive, the working poor have been pushed out. Today hunger in the suburbs is growing faster than in cities, having more than doubled since 2007.

Yet in the suburbs America's hungry don't look the part either. They drive cars, which are a necessity, not a luxury, here. Cheap clothes and toys can be found at yard sales and thrift shops, making a middle-class appearance affordable. Consumer electronics can be bought on installment plans, so the hungry rarely lack phones or televisions. Of all the suburbs in the country, northwest Houston is one of the best places to see how people live on what might be called a minimum-wage diet: It has one of the highest percentages of households receiving SNAP assistance where at least one family member holds down a job. The Jefferson sisters, Meme and Kai, live here in a four-bedroom, two-car-garage, two-bath home with Kai's boyfriend, Frank, and an extended family that includes their invalid mother, their five sons, a daughter-in-law, and five grandchildren. The house has a rickety desktop computer in the living room and a television in most rooms, but only two actual beds; nearly everyone sleeps on mattresses or piles of blankets spread out on the floor.

Though all three adults work full-time, their income is not enough to keep the family consistently fed without assistance. The root problem is the lack of jobs that pay wages a family can live on, so food assistance has become the government's-and society's-way to supplement low wages. The Jeffersons receive $125 in food stamps each month, and a charity brings in meals for their bedridden matriarch.

Like most of the new American hungry, the Jeffersons face not a total absence of food but the gnawing fear that the next meal can't be counted on. When Meme shows me the family's food supply, the refrigerator holds takeout boxes and beverages but little fresh food. Two cupboards are stocked with a smattering of canned beans and sauces. A pair of freezers in the garage each contain a single layer of food, enough to fill bellies for just a few days. Meme says she took the children aside a few months earlier to tell them they were eating too much and wasting food besides. "I told them if they keep wasting, we have to go live on the corner, beg for money, or something."

Stranded in a Food Desert

Jacqueline Christian is another Houston mother who has a full-time job, drives a comfortable sedan, and wears flattering clothes. Her older son, 15-year-old Ja'Zarrian, sports bright orange Air Jordans. There's little clue to the family's hardship until you learn that their clothes come mostly from discount stores, that Ja'Zarrian mowed lawns for a summer to get the sneakers, that they're living in a homeless shelter, and that despite receiving $325 in monthly food stamps, Christian worries about not having enough food "about half of the year."

Christian works as a home health aide, earning $7.75 an hour at a job that requires her to crisscross Houston's sprawl to see her clients. Her schedule, as much as her wages, influences what she eats. To save time she often relies on premade food from grocery stores. "You can't go all the way home and cook," she says.

On a day that includes running a dozen errands and charming her payday loan officer into giving her an extra day, Christian picks up Ja'Zarrian and her seven-year-old, Jerimiah, after school. As the sun drops in the sky, Jerimiah begins complaining that he's hungry. The neon glow of a Hartz Chicken Buffet appears up the road, and he starts in: Can't we just get some gizzards, please?

Christian pulls into the drive-through and orders a combo of fried gizzards and okra for $8.11. It takes three declined credit cards and an emergency loan from her mother, who lives nearby, before she can pay for it. When the food finally arrives, filling the car with the smell of hot grease, there's a collective sense of relief. On the drive back to the shelter the boys eat until the gizzards are gone, and then drift off to sleep.

Christian says she knows she can't afford to eat out and that fast food isn't a healthy meal. But she'd felt too stressed-by time, by Jerimiah's insistence, by how little money she has-not to give in. "Maybe I can't justify that to someone who wasn't here to see, you know?" she says. "But I couldn't let them down and not get the food."

Of course it is possible to eat well cheaply in America, but it takes resources and know-how that many low-income Americans don't have. Kyera Reams of Osage, Iowa, puts an incredible amount of energy into feeding her family of six a healthy diet, with the help of staples from food banks and $650 in monthly SNAP benefits. A stay-at-home mom with a high school education, Reams has taught herself how to can fresh produce and forage for wild ginger and cranberries. When she learned that SNAP benefits could be used to buy vegetable plants, she dug two gardens in her yard. She has learned about wild mushrooms so she can safely pick ones that aren't poisonous and has lobbied the local library to stock field guides to edible wild plants.

"We wouldn't eat healthy at all if we lived off the food-bank food," Reams says. Many foods commonly donated to-or bought by-food pantries are high in salt, sugar, and fat. She estimates her family could live for three months on the nutritious foods she's saved up. The Reamses have food security, in other words, because Kyera makes procuring food her full-time job, along with caring for her husband, whose disability payments provide their only income.

But most of the working poor don't have the time or know-how required to eat well on little. Often working multiple jobs and night shifts, they tend to eat on the run. Healthful food can be hard to find in so-called food deserts-communities with few or no full-service groceries. Jackie Christian didn't resort to feeding her sons fried gizzards because it was affordable but because it was easy. Given the dramatic increase in cheap fast foods and processed foods, when the hungry have money to eat, they often go for what's convenient, just as better-off families do.

It's a cruel irony that people in rural Iowa can be malnourished amid forests of cornstalks running to the horizon. Iowa dirt is some of the richest in the nation, even bringing out the poet in agronomists, who describe it as "black gold." In 2007 Iowa's fields produced roughly one-sixth of all corn and soybeans grown in the U.S., churning out billions of bushels.

These are the very crops that end up on Christina Dreier's kitchen table in the form of hot dogs made of corn-raised beef, Mountain Dew sweetened with corn syrup, and chicken nuggets fried in soybean oil. They're also the foods that the U.S. government supports the most. In 2012 it spent roughly $11 billion to subsidize and insure commodity crops like corn and soy, with Iowa among the states receiving the highest subsidies. The government spends much less to bolster the production of the fruits and vegetables its own nutrition guidelines say should make up half the food on our plates. In 2011 it spent only $1.6 billion to subsidize and insure "specialty crops"-the bureaucratic term for fruits and vegetables.

Those priorities are reflected at the grocery store, where the price of fresh food has risen steadily while the cost of sugary treats like soda has dropped. Since the early 1980s the real cost of fruits and vegetables has increased by 24 percent. Meanwhile the cost of nonalcoholic beverages-primarily sodas, most sweetened with corn syrup-has dropped by 27 percent.

"We've created a system that's geared toward keeping overall food prices low but does little to support healthy, high-quality food," says global food expert Raj Patel. "The problem can't be fixed by merely telling people to eat their fruits and vegetables, because at heart this is a problem about wages, about poverty."

When Christina Dreier's cupboards start to get bare, she tries to persuade her kids to skip snack time. "But sometimes they eat saltine crackers, because we get that from the food bank," she said, sighing. "It ain't healthy for them, but I'm not going to tell them they can't eat if they're hungry."

The Dreiers have not given up on trying to eat well. Like the Reamses, they've sown patches of vegetables and a stretch of sweet corn in the large green yard carved out of the cornfields behind their house. But when the garden is done for the year, Christina fights a battle every time she goes to the supermarket or the food bank. In both places healthy foods are nearly out of reach. When the food stamps come in, she splurges on her monthly supply of produce, including a bag of organic grapes and a bag of apples. "They love fruit," she says with obvious pride. But most of her food dollars go to the meat, eggs, and milk that the food bank doesn't provide; with noodles and sauce from the food pantry, a spaghetti dinner costs her only the $3.88 required to buy hamburger for the sauce.

What she has, Christina says, is a kitchen with nearly enough food most of the time. It's just those dicey moments, after a new bill arrives or she needs gas to drive the kids to town, that make it hard. "We're not starved around here," she says one morning as she mixes up powdered milk for her daughter. "But some days, we do go a little hungry."

Crops Taxpayers Support With Subsidies

How Subsidized Crops Affect Diet

Tracie McMillan is the author of The American Way of Eating and a Senior Fellow at the Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism at Brandeis University. Photographers Kitra Cahana, Stephanie Sinclair, and Amy Toensing are known for their intimate, sensitive portraits of people.

The magazine thanks The Rockefeller Foundation and members of the National Geographic Society for their generous support of this series of articles.

Maps and graphics by Virginia W. Mason and Jason Treat, NGM Staff. Help for the Hungry, sources: USDA; Food Research and Action Center; Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Stranded in a Food Desert, sources: USDA; City of Houston; U.S. Census Bureau. Crop Subsidies, research: Amanda Hobbs. Sources: Mississippi Department of Human Services; Environmental Working Group; National Cancer Institute.

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Why are people malnourished in the richest country on Earth?

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This article explores hunger. It talks about how the food supplies get so low and why, along with the affects it has on these countries

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Editor's note: This article was originally published April 3, 2017; it was updated April 28, 2018 to reflect the latest information.

Hunger knows no borders. It touches people in war-torn cities and rural villages; in vast, empty deserts and on tropical islands.

Hunger can't be boiled down to one cause or constrained by one geography. It requires a holistic approach - a willingness to look at all the factors, and anticipate tomorrow's needs while still meeting today's.

That's why Mercy Corps focuses on the root causes that drive it: things like conflict, climate change and poverty.

To see why, you only have to look at the Global Hunger Index (GHI), an annual ranking of the hungriest places in the world. Of the 11 countries at the bottom of the list, all have widespread poverty and most are experiencing ongoing conflict.

What are the 11 hungriest countries?
11. Haiti
10. Timor-Leste
9. Niger
8. Liberia
7. Sudan
6. Yemen
5. Zambia
4. Madagascar
3. Sierra Leone
2. Chad
1. Central African Republic

Read on to see where hunger hits the hardest and learn how Mercy Corps is helping people around the world build a future where everyone has enough to eat.

A devastating hunger emergency

Due to insufficient data, 13 countries are not included on the GHI for 2017, including nine that are identified as being cause for significant concern: Burundi, the Comoros, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Eritrea, Libya, Papua New Guinea, Somalia, South Sudan, and Syria.

Mercy Corps works in five of these countries - the DRC, Libya, Somalia, South Sudan, and Syria - to help people meet their urgent food needs, including in places currently experiencing a devastating hunger crisis.

The statistics are overwhelming: After seven years of war in Syria, more than 13 million people inside the country need humanitarian assistance. In the DRC, more than 9 million people are severely food insecure and need emergency aid. More than 3 million people in Somalia cannot meet their daily food needs and 1.2 million children are expected to be malnourished this year, while more than 5 million people in South Sudan are expected to face life-threatening hunger this year.

Get the quick facts about the Syria crisis ▸

Two of the four countries facing credible risk of famine this year are not included in the index: South Sudan and Somalia. The other two countries at risk, Nigeria and Yemen, are included in the GHI but aren't classified as "extremely alarming" when compared to other countries, given the inequality and timing of their crises. In Nigeria, for example, the risk of famine is concentrated in conflict-affected areas of the northeast, while the rest of the country faces minimal food-security concerns.

Get the quick facts about famine ▸

Mercy Corps is working hard to deliver lifesaving aid in these countries so people can meet their urgent needs. Learn more about our work and how you can help us respond to these crises here.

11. Haiti
To help Haiti recover from two major natural disasters, Mercy Corps is promoting economic opportunity and more sustainable agriculture. PHOTO: Fabiola Coupet/Mercy Corps
How bad is hunger in Haiti?

Half the country's population - more than 5 million people - is undernourished.

What are the causes of hunger in Haiti?

The January 2010 earthquake dealt a devastating blow to a country where 50 percent of people half the population lives on less than $1 a day. Still struggling to rebuild (and recover from 2016's Hurricane Matthew), many families are hungry and have no means to support themselves. Harmful environmental practices have also damaged the country's vital agricultural land, decreasing production and leading to increased food insecurity.

What work is being done to help?

Mercy Corps' long-term approach in Haiti focuses on economic opportunity, agriculture and the environment. We are helping families start new businesses, training young people with job skills, teaching farmers to diversify their gardens, and empowering women to strengthen their families.

10. Timor-Leste
In the face of a changing climate, Mercy Corps trained rice farmers in Timor-Leste to grow tilapia, allowing them to feed their families and make more money. PHOTO: Miguel Samper for Mercy Corps
How bad is hunger in Timor-Leste?

Only 16 years old, Timor-Leste is a young country, but its hunger problems run deep. Nearly half its population is poor, and more than 50 percent of children under 5 are stunted.

What are the causes of hunger in Timor-Leste?

The country'sIts financial sector is underdeveloped, and climate change posts a serious threat: drought, flooding and landslides often occur at the same time. Eighty percent of Timor's people rely on agriculture for food and income.

What work is being done to help?

Mercy Corps' approach focuses on agriculture, economic opportunity and the environment. We're helping farmers like Lino adjust to climate change, promoting clean energy so girls like Lourdes can build a stronger future, and supporting small businesses that can create new jobs.

9. Niger
Mercy Corps is teaching rural women in Niger how to grow stronger crops to get their families through the lean season. PHOTO: Sean Sheridan for Mercy Corps
How bad is hunger in Niger?

Almost 20 percent of its people do not have the food they need, and over 40 percent of children under 5 are chronically malnourished.

What are the causes of hunger in Niger?

Life in Niger can be extreme. Ranked near the bottom of the UN's Human Development Index, Niger faces several major challenges: its population is 80 percent rural, and nearly half of all Nigeriens live below the poverty line. The annual dry season all but halts food production every year and forces many people to leave the country to find work. Meanwhile, ongoing attacks from insurgent groups like Boko Haram are driving violence and displacement.

What work is being done to help

When hunger is this deeply ingrained in a community, it takes an integrated approach that touches all aspects of a community. Mercy Corps' approach in Niger touches all aspects of a community: We are teaching new farming methods and technologies, helping people save money through community savings groups, empowering girls like Dahara to start new businesses and build a future, improving access to veterinary services, and training women to make their communities healthier.

8. Liberia
A woman prepares traditional greens in Liberia. PHOTO: Sean Sheridan for Mercy Corps
How bad is hunger in Liberia?

Over 80 percent of people live on less than $1.25 a day. Almost half of its population is considered food insecure, and a third of children are malnourished.

What are the causes of hunger in Liberia?

The 2014-2015 Ebola epidemic in West Africa hit Liberia hard, killing over 4,800 people, devastating the lives of thousands more and wreaking havoc on the country's economy. Even though it's been two years since the outbreak ended, the economic impacts continue to threaten the progress the country has made in its recovery from a prolonged civil war that ended in 2003.

What work is being done to help?

To speed economic recovery and help families overcome the lingering effects of this crisis, Mercy Corps is distributing emergency food and providing seeds, tools and cash so people can restart their livelihoods and purchase food and supplies.

7. Sudan

How bad is hunger in Sudan?

Some 3.5 million people in the country need assistance, and almost half of the population lives in poverty.

What are the causes of hunger in Sudan?

Sudan is up against high inflation, a shrinking economy, student protests and protracted conflict, as well as stiff American sanctions and genocide charges related to Darfur. The independence of South Sudan in 2011 resolved years of civil war, but clashes continue to arise between Sudan and its new neighbor.

This conflict and the El Niño weather phenomenon have left millions without enough food to eat.

What work is being done to help?

Mercy Corps is working hard to support returnees and vulnerable host communities, connecting farmers to the agricultural tools, seeds and information they need to grow enough food to feed themselves and have enough left to sell in the local market. We are also drilling, repairing and maintaining critical water points, and supporting communities' capacity to spur local economic development and alleviate poverty.

6. Yemen
Yemen is one of four countries facing a serious food emergency that has put millions of lives in danger. PHOTO: Cassandra Nelson for Mercy Corps
How bad is hunger in Yemen?

Yemen is the poorest country in the Middle East, and one of the four countries at risk of famine. Today, 17.8 million Yemenis - over half the population - do not have enough to eat. More than 8 million people need urgent assistance for food and about 1.8 million children and 1.1 million pregnant or lactating mothers are suffering from acute malnutrition.

What are the causes of hunger in Yemen?

Yemen imports 90 percent of its food supply, but prolonged conflict has disrupted trade and continues to prevent families from getting the food they need to survive. Even before the current crisis, around half the population lived below the poverty line, and the country faced chronic instability, weak governance, underdevelopment and unemployment.

What work is being done to help?

Mercy Corps is on the ground in Yemen providing urgently needed items like food, water and sanitation supplies, as well as cash assistance where possible. Learn more about this emergency and what you can do to help.

5. Zambia

How bad is hunger in Zambia?

Unlike other countries on the list, Zambia is politically stable and has seen years of economic growth. Yet it has struggled to make any consistent gains in the fight against hunger. More than 60 percent of Zambians live in poverty and 40 percent of children under 5 are stunted.

What are the causes of hunger in Zambia?

Zambia's goal is to become an industrious middle-income country by 2030. But more than 4 out of every 10 people are considered extremely poor, and 1 out of every 5 children is an HIV/AIDS orphan. In the face of serious health and economic challenges, Zambia illustrates why we have to work broadly to solve hunger.

What work is being done to help?

In countries like Zambia that depend heavily on subsistence farming, Mercy Corps focuses long-term on promoting economic development, improving child and maternal health, and helping farmers grow more food to feed their families.

4. Madagascar

How bad is hunger in Madagascar?

Almost half the children in Madagascar are malnourished - the fourth-highest rate in the world.

What are the causes of hunger in Madagascar?

Madagascar has a unique and vibrant ecosystem, yet it also has a fundamental problem: 90 percent of its population lives on less than $2 a day. The country is also vulnerable to serious climate shocks, which are a major driver of hunger around the world.

What work is being done to help?

Mercy Corps is committed to helping communities adapt to a changing climate: In places like Ethiopia, Indonesia and Nepal, we integrate climate change into all our programming, helping farmers manage limited water supplies and better care for their land.

3. Sierra Leone

How bad is hunger in Sierra Leone?

Nearly 50 percent of the entire population is food insecure, but one of Sierra Leone's most tragic problems is child malnutrition, which causes almost half of all child deaths.

What are the causes of hunger in Sierra Leone?

Despite recent economic growth, Sierra Leone is still recovering from the ravages of civil war and a recent Ebola outbreak that killed more than 11,000 people in west Africa. It also shares a common problem among hungry countries: more than 75 percent of its population earns its income from agriculture and can't make enough money to afford proper food or medicine.

What work is being done to help?

The first 1,000 days of a child's life are critical. That's when the body and brain are growing most rapidly, and proper nutrition is vital. In countries like Ethiopia, Guatemala and Niger, Mercy Corps focuses on proper infant care and nutrition - including exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months - so mothers can start their children on the right track.

2. Chad

How bad is hunger in Chad?

With a soaring rate of poverty, Chad has one of the highest levels of hunger in the world. Approximately 40 percent of children under 5 are stunted from malnourishment.

What are the causes of hunger in Chad?

Being a farmer in Chad is almost impossible. This landlocked, arid African nation is prone to devastating droughts and crippling locust infestations. A staggering 87 percent of Chad's rural population lives below the poverty line, struggling to make it day-to-day in one of the hardest places on earth.

But Chad's problems are made worse by an increasing number of refugees fleeing violence at home. Almost 400,000 refugees have fled to Chad from Sudan, Central African Republic and Nigeria. The Lake Chad crisis is one of the world's untold emergencies, with hundreds of thousands of people facing devastating hunger.

What work is being done to help?

Conflict is one of the major drivers of hunger around the world. It handicaps food availability, forces families from their homes, and severely stresses host communities. It's one of the main reasons solving hunger in Africa takes so much more than food. Our work across the continent strives to help people tackle food insecurity at its source, with things like better farming practices, empowered women and safer, more cohesive communities.

1. Central African Republic
Central African Republic has one of the world's most serious food emergencies. Mercy Corps is working with community organizations to give families a stronger future. PHOTO: Jenny Bussey Vaughan/Mercy Corps
How bad is hunger in the Central African Republic?

The hunger crisis in Central African Republic is one of the world's most serious emergencies. It has the lowest ranking on the UN's Human Development Index and a fragile economy that has left 2.5 million people food insecure - half of its population.

What are the causes of huger in Central African Republic?

Plagued by poor governance and corruption, the country has been trapped in a cycle of conflict and underdevelopment for years.

What work is being done to help?

Despite the challenges the country faces, we still see a brighter future there. Mercy Corps is training vulnerable people to earn and save money to make their families more resilient. We're also working with community organizations to monitor human rights, engage marginalized groups, and better manage the disputes that make people so vulnerable.

Get involved
PHOTO: Sean Sheridan for Mercy Corps

Great progress has been made to alleviate hunger around the world, but there is still so much work to be done. We need your help.

Donate today. Every single contribution helps us meet urgent food needs and help families around the world build a stronger, healthier future.

Sign the petition. Tell Congress not to cut international aid. Around the world, people are in need of lifesaving assistance-including those affected by famine. We must continue to support them.

Tell your friends. Share this story or go to our Facebook page or Twitter page to spread the word about the millions who need us.

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Where are the 11 hungriest countries in the world?

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Editor's note: This article was originally published April 3, 2017; it was updated April 28, 2018 to reflect the latest information. Hunger knows no borders. It touches people in war-torn cities and rural villages; in vast, empty deserts and on tropical islands. Hunger can't be boiled down to one cause or constrained by one geography.

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Facts about how hunger is affecting many nations in Africa and especially the children in these areas. It also talk about how hunger is usually caused through poverty and other things.

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Starvation in Africa is now believed to be the most serious problem of all. Different sources say that every year hunger kills more people than diseases such as AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined all together. Many of those people are kids who die at very young age because of lack of food. The situation is very serious and African continent is in a grave danger. Hunger became a grim reaper who takes away countless numbers of lives each and every day.

Hunger statistics

Africa is the continent with the second largest number of hungry or malnourished people.

According to FAO (United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization), in 2014, over 20 % of African population was undernourished. That is around 227 million people who suffer from hunger.

In Sub-Saharan Africa one out of four persons is undernourished. Moreover, 23 million of school-age children in Africa attend classes hungry.

In the south parts of Somalia, almost half of the population suffers from malnourishment. This number constitutes the highest malnutrition rate in the world.

These statistics are really dreadful. While most of us take food for granted, for many African children it became a kind of luxury which is not always accessible.

Malnutrition in children

Malnutrition is especially dangerous for children during gestation and for those who have not reached the age of 2. For those kids malnutrition most often means permanent problems with physical and mental development.

The extreme form of malnutrition is called starvation. Children who suffer from starvation usually have: a thin body, short height, very low energy levels, and swollen legs and abdomen. They immune system is extremely weakened and they are vulnerable to all kinds of infections and diseases. The body has no strength to defend itself.

Moreover, malnourished mother is more likely to pass the HIV virus on to her child. HIV transmission is another very serious problem in African countries. And as you see, it is connected to starvation problem.

Another problem is chronic illnesses and diarrhea which are a very common phenomenon across the developing countries. They are also connected to the starvation problem as their occurrence accelerates the development of malnutrition.

Hunger facts

There are many different causes of hunger but most common are: poverty, environment, harmful economic systems, conflicts, and rapid population growth.

Poverty seems to be the most important factor. Many African families simply do not have enough money to buy food. As a result, parents and children are starving and the state is not concerned with their situation.

Environment is another problematic issue. People have to face erosion, desertification, deforestation, and of course droughts and water shortages. The agricultural production is sometimes extremely reduced. This reduction has a direct effect on hunger increase.

Economic systems in the world tend to gather all the supplies for the minority who live well. However, on the other hand, we have those who are barely able to survive. The control over resources is based on military, political and economic reasons which sometimes have nothing in common with welfare of the world's population.

Another factor connected with poverty and hunger are conflicts. In countries affected by wars many families experience a shortage of food supplies. Many of them are leaving their homes because of fear. They are leaving everything behind and usually end up in some refugee camp where they are forced to live in harsh conditions.

And the last but not least among the causes of hunger is the rapid population growth. This growth together with other negative factors leads to decrease of income in families. The decrease income means poverty and poverty means hunger.

African children in need

As you can easily notice, everything is connected. Malnourished children easily catch different diseases. Those diseases accelerate the speed of malnutrition development. Then children become even weaker; suffer from even more diseases and in the end they die. This is a little bit harsh; nevertheless, this is the truth.

In addition, African countries struggle with water pollution, droughts, conflicts, rapid population growth. All of these factors constitute a big challenge for the African families. They struggle with various problems every day in order to survive.

The people of African continent are not able to change this situation on their own. They desperately need help form the outside. Many actions must be taken simultaneously in order to improve lives of African children. How can you help?

Starvation - feed the children

Aid for Orphans Relief Foundation is concerned with the situation of starving children in Africa. We do our best to provide those kids with food, clean water, basic medications, and hygiene and wellness supplies. You are most welcome to join our efforts! Check out our donation page - there are a lot of different ways to support our charity foundation. Millions of hungry children are waiting for your help!

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Hunger in Africa - are you willing to feed the children?

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Starvation in Africa is now believed to be the most serious problem of all. Different sources say that every year hunger kills more people than diseases such as AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined all together. Many of those people are kids who die at very young age because of lack of food.

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A National anti-food waste NGO with a determined goal to end world hunger. They plan to do this by taking food from areas that have an abundance of it and give it to areas that have little to no food.

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Households toss limp vegetables. People are confused by food date labels. Restaurants often serve massive portions and trash leftovers. Grocery stores overstock their shelves to maintain an image of abundance. Farmers are unable to sell produce that doesn't look perfect.

At the same time, 1 in 8 Americans struggles to put food on the table.

An enormous amount of resources and energy go into growing, processing, transporting, and eventually disposing of all that wasted food. That includes climate-wrecking greenhouse gas emissions at every stage of the food system, plus water, fertilizer, packaging, labor, and more.

Most wasted food ends up in landfills, where it generates methane, a greenhouse gas that is up to 86 times more powerful than carbon dioxide.

NRDC is working on multiple fronts to change this. Through our national Save the Food campaign, we're raising awareness among consumers-the number one source of wasted food in the United States-and arming them with practical tips and tools to cut food waste at home.

Our groundbreaking research has shed light on the amounts and types of food going to waste in three cities and identified opportunities to redirect surplus food to those in need. Through in-depth community engagement, such as through our Nashville Food Waste Initiative and Food Matters work, NRDC is helping cities plan and implement creative approaches to prevent food from going to waste, increase food rescue, and recycle food scraps.

At the federal level, we advocate for sensible food date labeling and greater support for food donations. We also offer practical solutions to address the vast amount of food wasted in the restaurant, retail, and institutional food service sectors.

Wasted food is a problem we can solve. By keeping good food from going to waste, NRDC is helping fight climate change, conserve our natural resources, and build vibrant, resilient communities.

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Households toss limp vegetables. People are confused by food date labels. Restaurants often serve massive portions and trash leftovers. Grocery stores overstock their shelves to maintain an image of abundance. Farmers are unable to sell produce that doesn't look perfect. At the same time, 1 in 8 Americans struggles to put food on the table.