Somalia is experiencing one of its most severe hunger crises in recent memory, with 6.5 million people — roughly a third of the country's population — facing acute food insecurity. More than 2 million of those are in emergency conditions, one step below famine, while an estimated 1.8 million children under the age of five are at immediate risk of acute malnutrition. The crisis, driven by a convergence of climate shocks, armed conflict, and a collapsing humanitarian funding system, is deepening rapidly across the country.

At the heart of the disaster is a string of failed rainy seasons. Somalia has experienced at least three consecutive seasonal rainfall failures, drying out rivers, wells, and pasturelands that pastoral communities depend on entirely. Near Kismayo, a port city in southern Somalia, the landscape is dotted with the carcasses of dead livestock — animals that once provided milk, meat, and income for families who now have nothing. One displaced woman described watching her herd fall from 200 cattle to just four. Even when rains do arrive, aid workers say they come too unevenly and too late to reverse the collapse. Francesca Sangiorgi, humanitarian director at Save the Children, describes the pattern as