The World Food Program chief has warned that millions of people are close to starvation because of the deadly combination of conflict, climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic. United Nations food chief David Beasley called on the world’s billionaires to step up to help save about 30 million people he said are at risk of dying if they don’t receive help from the World Food Programme. Globally some 270 million people were headed toward the brink of starvation and WFP hopes to reach 138 million people this year, Beasley told the UN Security Council.
David Beasley told the UN Security Council that the response to his warning five months ago of a potential “hunger pandemic” had averted famine and kept people alive but the work wasn’t done. The WFP and its partners were going all out to reach as many as 138 million people this year, “the biggest scale-up in our history,” he said. But more was needed to help “the 270 million people marching toward the brink of starvation.” Already, 30 million rely solely on WFP for food to survive and will die without it, Beasley said.
“We need $4.9 billion to feed, for one year, all 30 million people who will die without WFP’s assistance,” Beasley said, noting that there are some 2,000 billionaires with a net worth of $8 trillion and several made billions during the pandemic. “I am not opposed to people making money, but humanity is facing the greatest crisis any of us have seen in our lifetimes,” said the former South Carolina governor.
Beasley cited Congo where violence has increased and instability already has forced 15.5 million people near starvation. He also said a lack of funding has forced cutbacks in assistance to feed people in Yemen, which faces the world’s worst humanitarian catastrophe. And in Nigeria and South Sudan, millions of more people have become food insecure because of the pandemic, he said
The combined wealth of America’s billionaires jumped over 19% or by half a trillion since the outbreak of the novel coronavirus pandemic in the United States, according to a report published by the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) in June. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, Tesla CEO Elon Musk, casino magnate Sheldon Adelson and others all saw their wealth increase by billions since the pandemic began.
“It’s time for those who have the most to step up, to help those who have the least in this extraordinary time in world history,” Beasley said. “The world needs you right now and it’s time to do the right thing.”
