Driven by the El Niño/La Niña phenomenon and the wider climate crisis, weather extremes such as severe floods in West Africa, and drought in Southern Africa and across Central America's Dry Corridor, also pushed millions of people to the brink.Emergency agriculture has life-saving impacts in the form of ensuring food is available for families and communities.

However, since the peak of humanitarian allocations in 2022, there has been a steady decline in available funds, which has been particularly evident in allocations to food sectors. From Haiti to Mali and South Sudan, financing trends for food, cash and emergency agriculture are simply not aligned with intensifying needs, even when these contexts record populations in catastrophic hunger conditions.In 2024, FAO requested USD 1.8 billion under its Humanitarian Response Plans to reach 43 million people with a range of agricultural assistance.

Despite receiving just 22 percent of those funds in 2024, by mid-year FAO had reached almost 20 million people in crisis countries with a combination of emergency and resilience assistance. When crisis-hit communities are given the means to meet their own needs, they see enormous benefits in terms of reduced hunger and malnutrition, stabilized livelihoods and a step towards greater resilience. Emergency agriculture offers a pathway out of hunger, even in the midst of violence. In 2025, FAO is seeking USD 1.9 billion under the humanitarian appeals. With these funds, over 49 million people could produce their own food and make their own way out of acute food insecurity.