Africa to face 'very serious' famine if wheat problem not solved

DAKAR, Senegal

Africa will face a "very serious" famine situation if wheat exports from Ukraine to the continent do not resume, Senegal's President Macky Sall, who is also chairman of the African Union, said Thursday.

The famine could destabilize the continent, Sall told French media outlets Radio France Internationale and France 24 television.

Mentioning his meeting last week with Russian President Vladimir Putin in the capital Moscow, Sall recalled that he asked Putin to help Africa access fertilizer and grain.

Sall said that during the meeting, he also called for ending the war on Ukraine.

UN officials warned last Friday that global food security was being threatened 100 days into the Russia-Ukraine war, saying it poses the threat of famine, destabilization and mass migration worldwide as Russia blockades the Black Sea ports that normally send grain to the world.

"The impasse on the Black Sea imperils global food and commodity security. Food insecurity is set to become even more worrying, with 1.7 billion people at risk of increased poverty due to the crisis," Amin Awad, UN crisis coordinator for Ukraine, said at a Geneva UN news conference from Kyiv.

Matthew Hollingworth, the UN World Food Program's emergency coordinator in Ukraine, referred to the Black Sea ports Russia is blockading as "the silver bullet" when it comes to avoiding global famines and global hunger.