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Publication | 2021

CAR: Acute Food Insecurity Projection Update April - August 2021- Nearly half of the population in Central African Republic highly food insecure due to insecurity and COVID-19

Global Food and Nutrition Security

The IPC projection update conducted in March 2021 indicates that, from April through August 2021, 2.29 million people in the Central African Republic will likely be in high levels of acute food insecurity (IPC Phase 3 or above), almost half of the population covered by the analysis.

In the analysis conducted in September 2020, the food security situation was projected to deteriorate between September 2020 - April 2021 (the current period) and May-August 2021 (the projection period), due to the likely worsening of the security situation throughout the country between October 2020 and January 2021. The initial projection for the period May-August 2021 did not take into account food assistance. However, since then, humanitarian organisations have responded with significant assistance to the crisis, preventing further deterioration.

In the March 2021 projection update, it is projected that 22 areas will be in Emergency (IPC Phase 4), as opposed to 10 areas projected to be in Emergency in the September 2020 analysis. This update of the April - August 2021 period therefore indicates a more critical situation. While the number of people in Phase 3 or above remained around the same as expected from the previous analysis for the projection period, a deterioration is observed because food insecurity remained steadily high despite the increased assistance. In conclusion, this update shows that both magnitude and severity of food insecurity increased for this period.

For this period, however, humanitarian funding is not yet fully mobilised to ensure an adequate food response that takes into account the significant increase in needs. Thus, the food response could be confronted with financial limitations and logistical constraints linked to the degradation of infrastructures in the rainy season, impacting the regularity of assistance.

In areas with varying degrees of security stability, immediate food assistance to the most vulnerable and support to maintain and restore livelihoods will be needed to strengthen the capacity of households to better prepare for the next growing season and thus ensure a positive harvest outcome. This will improve food availability and help limit the rise in national food prices.