In Nigeria, the number of people facing acute hunger has reached a record of nearly 31 million, the UN says. Northeastern Nigeria has been particularly hard hit. Escalating violence by various militant groups and cuts in global aid have exacerbated the hunger crisis.
00:00We are traveling to Gamburungala, an area in northeast Nigeria, where Islamist jihadist group Boko Haram is still very active.
00:08Fatal fields have been left untended as residents were forced to flee following years of attacks by criminal gangs.
00:16Many of them now live in displacement camps and depended on food aid which has now stopped due to responding cuts.
00:23Air travel is the only safest way of reaching the camps as armed criminals have made the roads to dangerous.
00:30This camp is the largest in Gamburungala.
00:35The refugees here are struggling to provide for their families.
00:38Travel beyond the camp borders is not safe as armed militants surround the perimeter.
00:45Kore Garba just rushed her youngest son, three-year-old Jime, to the stabilization center.
00:50There, he was diagnosed with severe malnutrition and other health complications.
00:56My son had a fever and refused to eat, so I took him to a chemist to buy drugs, but I had to rush him to the clinic when his condition got worse.
01:05My husband and I don't work, we live on food aid, but what we get is not enough to feed our family.
01:10The United Nations says this year, at least one million children face severe acute malnutrition here in Boronu and two neighboring states.
01:20Stabilization centers like this have been set up to treat severe malnutrition, but it is the only one serving the entire area.
01:28A second center was closed due to lack of funding, putting pressure on the remaining workers.
01:34Besides the funding cuts, the UN says the lane season, a period when food is most scarce, has also contributed to the hunger crisis.
01:45Residents in this camp gather daily at this storage center, hoping to get more food, but there is just not enough to go around.
01:53This is all Kautuma receives to feed her eight children.
01:59She says it is just enough for two days, and she is not sure of how much, if any, food she will get in September.
02:06I depend totally on the food intervention we get here in camp, because I don't have any means of income.
02:12Once I exhaust my food and the food support we get stops, I will be forced to take my children to the host communities and start begging for alms.
02:23The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, OCHA, says they received just a third of their expected funding for this year, and don't expect more to come.
02:33Trond Jensen, the head of office in Nigeria, wants the situation in the camps could get worse.
02:40What we are extremely concerned about is the fate, then, of children under five who are severely, acutely malnourished.
02:48That's a life-threatening condition, and if they don't get medical assistance, we are at risk of 420,000 children dying in Nigeria.
03:01The vulnerable here are already feeling the impact of the recent funding cuts.
03:06Unless more money comes in, their situation could get a lot worse.
