Some 41 countries including Pakistan continue to be in need of external assistance for food, with conflicts acting as the primary cause of high levels of food insecurity and adverse weather conditions - particularly rainfall shortages in Africa - acutely affecting food availability and access for millions of people, a quarterly report by the United Nations said.

The countries on the list, which include 31 in Africa, remained unchanged over the last six months, according to the Crop Prospects and Food Situation report issued today by the Food and Agriculture Organization.

The 41 countries currently in need of external food assistance are: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cabo Verde, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo, Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Democratic Republic of Congo, Djibouti, Eritrea, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Guinea, Haiti, Iraq, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Mozambique, Myanmar, Niger, Nigeria, Pakistan, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syrian Arab Republic, Uganda, Venezuela, Yemen and Zimbabwe.

Meanwhile, cereal harvests promise to be strong in several countries of Latin America and Asia, while improved security conditions helped boost crop production in the Syrian Arab Republic.

About half of the 41 countries needing external assistance for food are home to civil unrest or full-fledged conflict, while others face severe resource strains due to large influxes of refugees from neighboring countries experiencing unrest, adds the report.

However, FAO expects the 2019 aggregate cereal production for the 51 Low-Income Food-Deficit Countries (LIFDCs) to remain broadly unchanged at 473.5 million tonnes, a result emanating from growth in Asia offset by declines in Africa.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2019