Global Population of Acutely Hungry is Underestimated by ¼, with E. Lentz, H. Michelson, and K. Baylis (Revise & Resubmit at Nature Food)
Acute hunger affects hundreds of millions of people worldwide with long-term consequences for health, development and security. The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) system is the global method for classifying food insecurity severity and is used to allocate more than six billion dollars of humanitarian food assistance annually. Despite concerns that IPC estimates overstate globally food insecurity, our analysis of data from 2.8 billion people between 2017-2023 shows the opposite. We find that IPC assessments underestimate the number of acutely hungry people in the world, missing one in four. Using a non-parametric statistical approach, we find evidence of bunching or under-classification around the threshold that differentiates areas classified as ‘stressed’ from those ‘in crisis’—a critical threshold intended to trigger humanitarian funding. Contrary to widely held assumptions, our findings suggest that the prevalence and severity of acute hunger is significantly higher than current global estimates.