Abstract
From ancient Rome to modern times, humankind has suffered devastating periods of hunger caused by drought, war or misguided politics. According to United Nations humanitarian criteria, even if there are food shortages with large numbers of people lacking nutrition, a famine is declared only when certain measures of mortality, malnutrition and hunger are met. The criteria are at least 20% of households in an area face extreme food shortages with a limited ability to cope; acute malnutrition rates exceed 30% and the death rate exceeds two persons per day per 10,000 persons. Recently, South Sudan was declared the site of the world's first famine in six years, affecting about 100,000 people While South Sudan is officially experiencing famine, the UN has warned that Nigeria, Somalia and Yemen are all on the verge of the classification, which could affect more than 20 million people. The common denominator is protracted armed conflict and its negative impact on access to food, farming and livestock production ... livelihoods, trade and, not least, humanitarian delivery.
Of the four famine alerts, only one - Somalia - is caused by drought, while the other three stem from conflicts. In South Sudan, people have gone through cycles of displacement over the past three years, which have driven many of them to hide in swamps, having lost their homes, crops and livestock. With nothing else available, they spend days foraging for wild foods such as water lily roots, fruit or fish. They also spend days walking in search of food aid through areas controlled by armed groups. They are extremely weak, hungry, and drink unsafe water from ponds and rivers. Cholera is a constant threat (Aljazeera, 2017).
See paper here or https://www.academia.edu/32334834/Dying_of_Deprivation_The_Coldblooded_Extermination_of_the_South_Sudanese_-_RL_Vol_IX_No_XI_CXXI_MMXVII.pdf
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