Africa regional Overview of Food Security and Nutrition

After a long period of improvement, hunger in Africa - as measured by the prevalence of undernourishment - worsened in 2014-2018. This trend slowed in 2017-2018. Today 256 million Africans, or 20 percent of the population, are undernourished. Of these, 239 million are in sub­Saharan Africa and 17 million in Northern Africa.
There is significant variation in the levels and trends of hunger in Africa's subregions. The prevalence of undernourishment has for the past 18 years been highest in Eastern Africa and Central Africa, indicating persistent conslraints in terms of availabilily and access to food. However, over the 2014-2018 period, the trend in the prevalence of hunger worsened the most in Western and Central Africa, for the most part due to conflicts, climate extremes and economic slowdowns, sometimes combined.