South Sudan: Fleeing Famine in Northern South Sudan

Jun 15, 2016 | Henry Wilkins, Al Jazeera
View Original

Kanjak is situated in Northern Bahr el Ghazal, a region of South Sudan close to the border with its neighbour Sudan. It has recently entered "phase 4", an "emergency" on the Integrated Phase Classification (IPC) scale, used by governments and humanitarian organisations to measure the severity of food shortages. For some, phase 4 means gaps of days between meals. More than 20 percent of the population also suffer from acute malnutrition, while the death rate among the most vulnerable - the old and the young - increases significantly. The next phase on the scale is full-blown famine. Northern Bahr el Ghazal is a region of South Sudan that is usually self-sufficient in food, but because of an economic collapse in parts of the country and two years of poor rains, it is unable to provide for itself this year.