A new global report has listed Nigeria among the top 10 countries driving the world’s worst food crisis, with conflict and instability pushing millions into acute hunger.
The 2026 Global Report on Food Crises by an alliance of United Nations agencies, the European Union and development partners, showed that Nigeria and nine other conflict-affected nations account for nearly two-thirds of people facing acute food insecurity worldwide.
According to the report, about 266 million people across 47 countries experienced high levels of acute food insecurity in 2025 representing almost a quarter of the population analysed and nearly double the proportion recorded in 2016.
The report highlighted that the global hunger crisis was no longer temporary but increasingly entrenched, particularly in conflict-affected regions.
Earlier in January, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Nigeria stated that about 35 million Nigerians are at risk of acute hunger in 2026.
The report identified conflict as the leading driver of food insecurity, accounting for more than half of those facing severe hunger globally.
The 10 hardest-hit countries include Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Myanmar, Nigeria, Pakistan, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.
At the most extreme level, famine was confirmed in 2025 in Gaza and parts of Sudan the first time since the report’s inception that two separate famines have been recorded in a single year.
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres, in the report’s foreword, described the findings as urgent and alarming.