UN-backed report warns of escalating global drought risk, calls for urgent action

GIRLS pulled from school and forced into marriage. Hospitals plunged into darkness. Endangered dolphins floated lifeless in the shrinking Amazon... These are not scenes from a horror film, but real consequences of some of the most devastating droughts in recorded history, according to a new UN-backed report released Wednesday.

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Prepared by the US National Drought Mitigation Centre (NDMC) and the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), with support from the International Drought Resilience Alliance, the report Drought Hotspots Around the World 2023-2025 provides a comprehensive account of how droughts compound poverty, hunger, energy insecurity, and ecosystem collapse.

It warns that drought, fueled by climate change and relentless pressure on land and water, has escalated since 2023 into one of the most widespread and damaging crisis in recorded history, triggering cascading shocks to food, energy, ecosystems, and human survival, Xinhua news agency reported.

Eastern and Southern Africa are among the worst-affected regions. Over 90 million people are facing acute hunger. Southern Africa, already drought-prone, was devastated, with about 68 million, roughly one in six people, needing food aid in August 2024.

In Zimbabwe alone, the 2024 corn crop was down 70 per cent year on year, and doubling maize prices, while 9,000 cattle died of thirst and starvation. In Somalia, drought-related hunger led to an estimated 43,000 deaths in 2022. Zambia faced a major energy crisis in 2024 when the Zambezi River fell to just 20 per cent of its long-term average. The country's largest hydroelectric plant fell to 7 per cent generation capacity, causing blackouts of up to 21 hours per day.