Global hunger affecting 815 million people: Study

A recent study has claimed that after a steady decline, global hunger levels of people have risen in more than a decade, which is affecting 815 million people of the world's population.

The new UN report stated that the global hunger, which is driven by conflict and climate change, is affecting 815 million people in 2016 or 11 percent of the global population.

At the same time, multiple forms of malnutrition are threatening the health of millions worldwide.

In addition to an increase in the proportion of the world's population that suffers from chronic hunger (prevalence of undernourishment), the number of undernourished people on the planet has also increased to 815 million, up from 777 million in 2015.

Some 155 million children, aged under five, are stunted (too short for their age), the report says, while 52 million suffer from wasting; meaning their weight is too low for their height.

An estimated 41 million children are now overweight.

Anaemia among women and adult obesity is also a cause for concern. These trends are a consequence not only of conflict and climate change but also of sweeping changes in dietary habits as well as economic slowdowns.

The report is the first UN global assessment on food security and nutrition to be released following the adoption of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which aims to end hunger and all forms of malnutrition by 2030 as a top international policy priority.

Famine struck in parts of South Sudan for several months in early 2017, and there is a high risk that it could reoccur there as well as appear in other conflict-affected places, namely northeast Nigeria, Somalia and Yemen, they noted.

The report further explained that undernutrition, overweight and their associated non-communicable diseases now coexist in many regions, countries and even households.

Six nutrition indicators - three that form part of the SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals) monitoring framework and three that refer to global nutrition targets agreed by the World Health Assembly, are described below to better understand the multiple burden of malnutrition, which affects all regions in the world.