Global humanitarian needs highest on record

In reaction to today’s UN 2023 Global Humanitarian Overview report, revealing that 339 million people are in urgent need of humanitarian aid – the highest caseload in history – Oxfam’s Global Humanitarian Director Marta Valdes Garcia said:

“The fact that one in every 23 people around the world is in urgent need of humanitarian aid must be an immediate wake-up call.

“Humanitarian need is outstripping the aid system’s ability to respond. People are being made homeless, hungry and sick by climate change, conflict, and economic failure. But these are not isolated issues, they’re part of the same endemic crisis. We need a radical overhaul of how our global systems work, putting the dignity and rights of people in crisis first.

“Whilst we must immediately respond to this unprecedented humanitarian need, we must also find ways to change a runaway global financial system where the few are benefitting at the cost of the many. It cannot be right that we have hundreds of new food and energy billionaires yet we cannot fund the basic humanitarian needs of millions of starving people.

“Donors must immediately meet the UN global humanitarian appeal to help save lives now. Funding to prevent disasters should have no strings attached; and to nip escalating crises in the bud, decisions and actions must be led by local communities.”