LONDON - A "perfect storm" of drought, conflict and rising costs has increased the ranks of the chronically hungry by millions of people, and forced aid workers to find and fund longer-term solutions to the food crisis.
As the world marked World Food Day on Tuesday, the United Nations said the number of chronically hungry people around the globe rises by an average of 4 million each year.
At the same time global fuel prices have soared, pushing up road transport costs and global maritime shipping rates.
The U.N.'s World Food Programme (WFP) says the cost of cereals has risen 50 percent over the past five years, which experts say is due to the world's growing population -- particularly in non-food producing urban areas -- combined with bad harvests and an increased demand for cereal products in previously rice-eating India and China.
Conflict in some of the world's poorest regions has created refugee crises and experts warn climate change may promote more fighting over resources, demolishing coping strategies and pushing already vulnerable families over the edge.
"It is a perfect storm," said WFP Africa spokesman Peter Smerdon. "They all feed into each other."
Worst affected is sub-Saharan Africa, home to 21 of the 36 states worldwide requiring food assistance.
WFP says it is most concerned about Somalia where drought and conflict have coincided to produce what some say is the country's worst humanitarian crisis.
Violence has restricted handouts and fighting between the transitional government, its Ethiopian allies and insurgents has forced thousands to flee Mogadishu to makeshift camps.
The closure of the capital's main market -- a food and job lifeline which has been the scene of repeated fighting and was recently burned -- has also hit supplies and buying power.
LONG TERM SAVINGS?
In southern Africa, food crises in Zimbabwe and the kingdoms of Lesotho and Swaziland share two causes: drought, which has also hit regional producer South Africa and driven up prices, and AIDS, which has killed farmers and in turn cut output.
