AFRICA Regional overview of food security and nutrition 2021: Statistics and trends

Africa is not on track to meet the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 2 targets to end hunger and ensure access by all people to safe, nutritious and sufficient food all year round, and to end all forms of malnutrition. The most recent estimates show that 281.6 million people on the continent, over one-fifth of the population, faced hunger in 2020, which is 46.3 million more than in 2019. This deterioration continues a trend that started in 2014, after a prolonged period of improving food security.

The food security situation is determined by a number of key, often overlapping, drivers, including conflict, climate variability and extremes, economic slowdowns and downturns, and the unaffordability of healthy diets. The situation is often exacerbated by difficult underlying conditions, such as poverty and inequality, and sometimes by inappropriate policies. More recently, the national and global measures undertaken to contain the COVID-19 pandemic have disrupted economic and livelihood activities in service sectors such as tourism, remittances, commodity exports, markets and commodity value chains. Real gross domestic product in Africa fell by 2.1 percent in 2020, primarily due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and many governments rapidly expanded social protection measures to protect the most vulnerable.

In addition to hunger, millions of Africans suffer from widespread micronutrient deficiencies, while overweight and obesity are already significant public health concerns in many countries. Progress towards achieving the global nutrition targets by 2030 remains unacceptably slow.

The many challenges to improving food security and nutrition on the continent are considerable and it will take close collaboration across countries and at the international level to address them effectively. Together with interventions in health, water and education, the agrifood system plays an important role in achieving SDG 2. However, considerable efforts are needed throughout the agrifood system, involving many stakeholders, to transition to more efficient, inclusive, resilient and sustainable agrifood systems for better production, better nutrition, a better environment and for better lives for all, and to ensure that no one is left behind.

A common vision, strong political leadership and effective cross-sectoral collaboration, which includes the private sector, are essential to agree on trade-offs and to identify and implement sustainable solutions that transform agrifood systems so they can deliver healthy, affordable diets. Countries must engage in and leverage the outcomes of the United Nations Food Systems Summit, the Nutrition for Growth Summit and the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26).