Question to the Department for International Development:

To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what steps the Government is taking to prevent famine in South Sudan.

The UK has adopted the role of early responder to the crisis in South Sudan and is the second largest donor to the country’s Crisis Response Plan. Between January and September 2014, DFID contributed £82.5 million of humanitarian funding to South Sudan which included £16 million to the World Food Programme for general food distribution, £8.3 million to the Food and Agricultural Organisation of the United Nations, and £8 million to the International Committee of the Red Cross to stimulate local production via seed, tool and fishing net distribution, as well as vaccination of livestock. Recent UN food security analysis has found that the emergency food security response was a critical factor in averting a widely-predicted outbreak of famine in 2014.

Despite success to date in famine-prevention, communities in conflict-affected states remain extremely vulnerable and we remain concerned about the humanitarian situation in 2015 as the risk of famine is still very real if the conflict continues. For this reason, the UK announced last month a further £25 million of assistance, the majority of which will be spent on work to bolster food security. We continue to work with the UN and other donors to raise the prominence of the appeal and secure new and increased commitments of funds.