South Sudan

722 of the world’s biggest corporations together raked in over $1 trillion in windfall profits each year for the past two years amid soaring prices and interest rates, while billions of people are having to cut back or go hungry. 

Oxfam is deeply disappointed by today’s donors’ dismally inadequate pledges to East Africa’s crisis; a protracted crisis which continues to be woefully underfunded.

Thousands of South Sudanese communities are opening their own doors and offering their meagre resources to refugees fleeing the conflict in neighbouring Sudan. Oxfam is calling for donor countries to step up to avoid a disaster.

Oxfam is supporting a humanitarian response for refugees arriving from Sudan into South Sudan’s Renk and Raban counties in Upper Nile State, and in Chad’s Sila province. 

In reaction to the GRFC 2023, Oxfam Global Food and Economic Security Lead, Emily Farr, said:  “For global hunger to rise for a fourth consecutive year in a world of plenty is a stain on our collective humanity. Decades of progress made to end poverty and hunger are being fast-reversed by conflict, economic shocks, and climate change.  

Despite promises, nearly three-quarters of African governments reduced their agricultural budgets while paying almost double that on arms.

More than half the population of South Sudan – 6.6 million people – are severely hungry, including 2.2 million people at risk of starvation. Yet the humanitarian response remains woefully underfunded and without an urgent increase in aid now, 7.7 million people or two-thirds of the population will face severe food shortages next year, Oxfam warned today.

Food inflation in some East African countries outstrips the global average leaving millions hungry, while food billionaires increased their wealth by $382bn over the last two years.

The G7 must pursue windfall taxes on excess corporate profits including from those making huge returns from surging food and energy prices. The revenues can be used to fund an end to global hunger and to tackle climate change, says Oxfam.

The amount of money needed for UN humanitarian appeals involving extreme weather events like floods or drought is now eight times higher than 20 years ago — and donors are failing to keep up, reveals a new Oxfam brief today. For every $2 needed for UN weather-related appeals, donor countries are only providing $1.