NEAR EAST AND NORTH AFRICA Regional Overview of Food Security and Nutrition 2023: Statistics and trends

For specific country notes, please refer to Tables A.1.1 and A.1.2 in FAO, IFAD, UNICEF, WFP & WHO. 2023. The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2023. Urbanization, agrifood system transformation and healthy diets across the rural-urban continuum. Rome, FAO. https://doi.org/10.4060/cc3017en

Prevalence of undernourishment

Regional estimates were included when more than 50 percent of the population was covered. National estimates are reported as three-year moving averages to control the low reliability of some of the underlying parameters such as the year-to-year variation in food commodity stocks, one of the components of the annual FAO Food Balance Sheets, for which complete and reliable information is scarce. Regional and global aggregates are reported as annual estimates on account of the fact that possible estimation errors are expected not to be correlated across countries.

Food insecurity

Regional estimates were included when more than 50 percent of the population was covered. To reduce the margin of error, national estimates are presented as three-year averages.

FAO estimates refer to the number of people living in households where at least one adult has been found to be food insecure.

Country-level results are presented only for those countries for which estimates are based on official national data or as provisional estimates, based on FAO data collected through the Gallup^© World Poll, for countries whose national relevant authorities expressed no objection to their publication. Note that consent to publication does not necessarily imply validation of the estimate by the national authorities involved and that the estimate is subject to revision as soon as suitable data from official national sources are available. Global, regional and subregional aggregates are based on data collected in approximately 150 countries.

Child stunting, wasting and overweight

For child wasting regional estimates, values correspond to the model predicted estimates for the year 2022 only. Wasting is an acute condition that can change often and rapidly over the course of a calendar year. This makes it difficult to generate reliable trends over time with the input data available – as such, this report provides only the most recent global and regional estimates.

Some aggregates for wasting are calculated by FAO.

Exclusive breastfeeding

Regional estimates are included when more than 50 percent of the population is covered.