• More than half a million people in Gaza are trapped in famine, marked by widespread starvation, destitution and preventable deaths, according to a new Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) analysis released on August 22.

• Almost two years of conflict, repeated displacement, and severe restrictions on humanitarian access, compounded by repeated interruptions and impediments to access to food, water, medical aid, support to agriculture, livestock and fisheries and the collapse of health, sanitation, and market systems, have pushed people into starvation.

• The new assessment reports the most severe deterioration since the IPC began analysing acute food insecurity and acute malnutrition in Gaza Strip, and it marks the first time a famine has been officially confirmed in the Middle East region.

• By the end of September, more than 640,000 people will face Catastrophic levels of food insecurity – classified as IPC Phase 5 – across the Gaza Strip. 

• An additional 1.14 million people in the territory will be in Emergency (IPC Phase 4) and a further 396 000 people in Crisis (IPC Phase 3) conditions. 

• Conditions in North Gaza are estimated to be as severe, or worse, than in Gaza City.

• The Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO), UNICEF, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and the World Health Organisation (WHO) have collectively and consistently highlighted the extreme urgency for an immediate and full-scale humanitarian response given the escalating hunger-related deaths, rapidly worsening levels of acute malnutrition and plummeting levels of food consumption, with hundreds of thousands of people going days without anything to eat.

• An immediate ceasefire and end to the conflict is critical to allow unimpeded, large-scale humanitarian response that can save lives. 

• The agencies are also gravely concerned about the threat of an intensified military offensive in Gaza City and any escalation in the conflict, as it would have further devastating consequences for civilians where famine conditions already exist. 

Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC)

• The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) is an innovative multi-stakeholder initiative to improve analysis and decision-making on food security and nutrition.

• Using the IPC classification and analytical approach, governments, UN agencies, NGOs, and other stakeholders work together to determine the severity and extent of acute and chronic food insecurity and acute malnutrition situations within countries, according to internationally recognised standards.

• The IPC was developed in 2004 by the Food Security and Nutrition Analysis Unit (FSNAU), managed by the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) in Somalia.

• The request for a food security measurement tool was motivated by a growing need for rigorous, evidence-based, consensus-based and actionable food security information to facilitate an effective humanitarian response in the Somali context. 

• The IPC became more widely applicable in the following years, as it served as a “common currency” for food security and nutrition analysis. 

• Since its inception, the IPC initiative is now described as the ‘global standard’ for classifying acute food insecurity and malnutrition affecting millions globally.

• The IPC has proved to be one of the best practices in the global food security field, and a model of collaboration in over 30 countries in Latin America, Africa and Asia.

IPC Classification System

• The IPC Classification System distinguishes and links Acute Food Insecurity, Chronic Food Insecurity and Acute Malnutrition to support more strategic and better coordinated responses.

• The protocols used by the IPC are harmonised across the three individual scales (IPC Acute Food Insecurity, IPC Chronic Food Insecurity, and IPC Acute Malnutrition). 

• This allows for the analysis of linkages between the three conditions and the possibility of detangling acute food insecurity, chronic food insecurity and acute malnutrition, in support of a more strategic response analysis.

IPC classifies the severity of Acute Food Insecurity into five severity phases: 

i) None/Minimal - Households are able to meet essential food and non-food needs without engaging in atypical and unsustainable strategies to access food and income.

ii) Stressed - Households have minimally adequate food consumption but are unable to afford some essential non-food expenditures without engaging in stress coping strategies. 

iii) Crisis - Households either have food consumption gaps that are reflected by high or above-usual acute malnutrition; or are marginally able to meet minimum food needs but only by depleting essential livelihood assets or through crisis-coping strategies.

iv) Emergency - Households either: have large food consumption gaps that are reflected in very high acute malnutrition and excess mortality; or are able to mitigate large food consumption gaps but only by employing emergency livelihood strategies and asset liquidation. 

v) Catastrophe/Famine - Households have an extreme lack of food and/or other basic needs even after full employment of coping strategies. Starvation, death, destitution and extremely critical acute malnutrition levels are evident. For famine classification, the area needs to have extreme critical levels of acute malnutrition and mortality.

What is the threshold for famine?

• The IPC sets the global standards for famine classification. 

• The IPC plays a critical role in identifying famine conditions, and informing the response needed to save millions of lives.

• Famine is the most severe phase of the IPC. 

• The IPC defines famine as an extreme deprivation of food. Starvation, death, destitution and extremely critical levels of acute malnutrition are or will likely be evident.

A famine classification (IPC Phase 5) is the highest phase of the IPC Acute Food Insecurity scale, and is attributed when an area has:

a) At least 20 per cent of the population in that particular area are facing extreme levels of hunger.

b) At least 30 per cent of children suffer from acute malnutrition.

c) Two deaths for every 10,000 adults and four deaths per 10,000 children daily due to outright starvation.

• The IPC does not “declare famine” or issue “famine declarations”, but rather facilitates the analysis that allows governments, international/regional organisations and humanitarian agencies to issue more prominent statements or declarations.