The conflict has severely disrupted global supply chains, particularly through the Strait of Hormuz, where a quarter of the world's fertilizer supply is at a virtual standstill, according to WFP Deputy Executive Director Carl Skau. The Suez Canal is unsafe for aid shipments, and the route through Pakistan to Afghanistan is no longer viable, forcing aid to travel around Africa, via Turkey, Turkmenistan, and Azerbaijan, said WFP Director of Supply Chain Corinne Fleischer. Skau warned that supply chains may be on the brink of the most severe disruption since COVID and the Ukraine war in 2022.
Humanitarian operations are facing major challenges. WFP's shipping costs have risen 18% due to the conflict, and thousands of trucks are running on more expensive fuel, Skau said. The agency has been forced to cut food rations for people in famine conditions in Sudan and can only support one in four acutely malnourished children in Afghanistan.
The first measure [that must be taken] is to stop the war or at least come to some type of normalisation of the shipping lanes in the Strait of Hormuz.
The spike in global food and fuel costs could leave millions of families priced out of staple foods, particularly in import-dependent countries like sub-Saharan Africa and Asia, Skau added. Humanitarian assistance from Gulf states to Lebanon has stopped, according to UN aid official Imran Riza. According to reports, the conflict, now in its third week, was sparked by Israeli and US strikes on Iran and retaliatory attacks by Tehran and allied groups.
Iranian counterstrikes against Gulf states and Israeli attacks on Hezbollah targets in Lebanon are ongoing, reports indicate. A 10-day ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon came into effect on Thursday night, according to officials. US President Donald Trump said both sides are 'very close' to making a deal with Iran, and talks could resume in Islamabad as early as this weekend.
If you don't do these targeted, timely, macroeconomic interventions, you will have many more ripple effects.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres asserted that the war must stop and that all Security Council resolutions, including resolution 2817, must be implemented. According to Euronews, UNDP Administrator Alexander De Croo described the first measure needed as stopping the war or normalizing shipping lanes in the Strait of Hormuz. He also called for macroeconomic interventions such as targeted cash-outs or free access to fuel and cooking gas.
De Croo noted that the impact goes beyond the region, severely affecting Sub-Saharan Africa and small island states in the Pacific. The number of people affected by famine in the Middle East could be 'terribly high' if the wars continue over the summer, Skau said.
And we have not talked about the ripple effects of poverty, of food insecurity. That could lead to additional conflicts. That could lead to more displacement and migration flows, which could lead to other types of extremism.
The impact goes way beyond the region. For example, Sub-Saharan Africa is severely impacted by what is going on in the region. Small island states, for example, in the Pacific, you start to have a few islands that just don't have enough fuel anymore. So the impact of the war and the blockade that is linked to it has a deep impact.
War is development in reverse.
It takes decades to lift people out of poverty. It takes six weeks of work to push them back into poverty.
Am I confident? I have no crystal ball. Am I hopeful? Yes.
Beyond the immediate fallout in Lebanon, the conflict has also caused major knock-on effects on global humanitarian operations; we are really feeling the pain on this.
Our supply chains may really be on the brink of the most severe disruption since COVID and the Ukraine war back in 2022.
If the Middle East conflict continues through June, an additional 45 million people could be pushed into acute hunger by price rises.
This would take global hunger levels to an all-time record and it's a terrible, terrible prospect.