Draft, not yet released. In stewardship review. Not indexed until the first approved release.

Key findings

Twelve findings carry the food baseline. They are grouped by coupling and never ranked. Each resolves to its source or, where Nexus analysis is involved, to its stated method.

5 min read1 figure0 tables10 notesNR-SECTOR-FOOD-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE

Contents
  1. ·Edition home
  2. ·Executive summary
  3. 1Food is where the systems meet
  4. 2Key findings
    1. 2.1 Headline finding
    2. 2.2 Food
    3. 2.3 Health
    4. 2.4 Governance
    5. 2.5 Trade
    6. 2.6 Finance
    7. 2.7 Climate forcing
    8. 2.8 Systemic
  5. 3Systems and sectors at baseline
  6. 4Risks and capability
  7. 5Harvest shortfall under high input costs
  8. 6Readings from the other desks
  9. 7The 2027 agenda
  10. 8Systems in depth
  11. AMethodology
  12. BData appendix
  13. CReferences and record
  14. ·Complete edition, for print

2.1Headline finding

ReportedEQL 5NRF-SECTOR-FOOD-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE-FOO-002

In 2025, hunger affected 309 million people in Africa, 292 million in Asia and 32 million in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Figure 2.1People facing hunger by region, 2025 (million)
ItemBar, scaled to the largest valueValue
Africa309
Asia292
Latin America and the Caribbean32

Source: SOFI 20261.

Implication

For the first time Africa hosts the largest number of hungry people. One in five Africans faced hunger in 2025, against 6.0% in Asia and 4.8% in Latin America and the Caribbean. By 2030 the SOFI scenarios place 56% of those facing hunger in Africa1.

What would move it

The next SOFI report, the 2026 El Niño lean season and the path of fertiliser prices would each move this finding.

2.2Food

  1. ReportedEQL 5NRF-SECTOR-FOOD-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE-FOO-001

    An estimated 7.8% of the world population faced hunger in 2025, about 645 million people (range 608 to 696 million), down from 8.1% in 2024 and 8.6% in 2022, but about 50 million more people than in 2015.1

  2. ReportedEQL 5NRF-SECTOR-FOOD-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE-FOO-002

    Africa now hosts the largest number of hungry people: 309 million in 2025, against 292 million in Asia and 32 million in Latin America and the Caribbean, or 20.0%, 6.0% and 4.8% of their populations.1

  3. ReportedEQL 5NRF-SECTOR-FOOD-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE-FOO-003

    About 2.1 billion people (25.8%) were moderately or severely food insecure in 2025, down from 27.1% in 2024 and 28.7% in 2020, and 778.6 million (9.5%) were severely food insecure.1

  4. ReportedEQL 3NRF-SECTOR-FOOD-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE-FOO-008

    FAO forecast in early September 2026 that world cereal output would be 2,980 million tonnes, 2.0% below the 2025 record and still the second largest on record, with 2026/27 trade at 509.3 million tonnes and Black Sea export routes flagged as a risk; USDA stocks and Russian wheat exports are NOT BOUND at the close.49

2.3Health

  1. ReportedEQL 4NRF-SECTOR-FOOD-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE-HLT-004

    About 2.69 billion people (32.7%) could not afford a healthy diet in 2025, down from 2.97 billion in 2021, but the share rose to 66.6% in Africa, and the global cost of a healthy diet rose to 4.28 PPP dollars from 2.94 in 2017.1

  2. ReportedEQL 4NRF-SECTOR-FOOD-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE-HLT-011

    WHO estimates 866 million foodborne illnesses and 1.52 million deaths in 2021, with a productivity and medical cost of USD 310 billion a year.9

2.4Governance

  1. ReportedEQL 4NRF-SECTOR-FOOD-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE-GOV-005

    About 266 million people in 47 countries and territories faced high levels of acute food insecurity in 2025, 22.9% of the analysed population, with famine confirmed in parts of the Gaza Strip and the Sudan; the total mainly reflects fewer countries analysed than in 2024.41

2.5Trade

  1. ReportedEQL 4NRF-SECTOR-FOOD-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE-TRD-006

    Export volumes through the Strait of Hormuz fell below 10% of pre-conflict levels by early March 2026; up to 30% of internationally traded fertilisers and 30 to 35% of urea exports normally come from or transit the Gulf, and there are no internationally coordinated fertiliser reserves.14

2.6Finance

  1. ReportedEQL 5NRF-SECTOR-FOOD-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE-FIN-007

    The FAO Food Price Index averaged 133.3 points in August 2026, 2.5% above a year earlier and 1.9% above July; wheat prices were 15.0% above a year earlier and maize prices rose 2.5% in the month.48

2.7Climate forcing

  1. ReportedEQL 3NRF-SECTOR-FOOD-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE-CLI-009

    WMO forecasts a near-100% probability that El Niño persists through December 2026 to February 2027; its effect on 2027 harvests and on the following lean season is NOT BOUND at the close.8

  2. ReportedEQL 4NRF-SECTOR-FOOD-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE-CLI-010

    Agrifood systems emitted 16.5 Gt CO2eq in 2023, 32% of anthropogenic emissions, against 18 Gt and 34% for 2015 in the EDGAR-FOOD estimate and a range of 21 to 37% in the IPCC assessment.211020

2.8Systemic

  1. Expert inputEQL 2NRF-SECTOR-FOOD-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE-SYS-012

    The leading compound pathway for 2027 testing is an El Niño harvest shortfall that coincides with high fertiliser and freight costs and constrained Black Sea exports, hitting import-dependent low-income countries as humanitarian funding falls. § scenario

Notes

Numbers are the edition’s reference numbers, so a note reads the same in every chapter. The full list, with every source and its licence, is in Annex C. Annex C, references

  1. 1FAO, IFAD, UNICEF, WFP and WHO (eds.), The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2026 (published 21 July 2026; full report opened). FAO, Rome. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  2. 49Rural Voice (ed.), report of 6 September 2026 on the FAO Cereal Supply and Demand Brief of 4 September 2026 (the report was opened; the FAO brief page for that release was not, and only the later 2 October release was available). Observation year 2026. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  3. 9WHO (ed.), Food safety fact sheet, including the estimates of the global burden of foodborne diseases 2000 to 2021 published in 2026. World Health Organization, Geneva. Observation year 2021. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  4. 4European Commission Joint Research Centre (ed.), Global Report on Food Crises 2026, summary page on Knowledge for Policy (the report was released 24 April 2026 by FAO, WFP and the Global Network Against Food Crises; the summary page was opened, the report was not). European Commission, Brussels. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  5. 14FAO (ed.), Global Agrifood Implications of the 2026 Conflict in the Middle East: Impacts on energy and fertiliser trade, and food security, information note of 15 March 2026. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome. Observation year 2026. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  6. 48FAO (ed.), FAO Food Price Index, release of 4 September 2026 (August 2026 values; newsroom release opened). Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome. Observation year 2026. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  7. 8WMO (ed.), El Niño/La Niña Update, August 2026 (factsheet). World Meteorological Organization, Geneva. Observation year 2026. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  8. 21FAO (ed.), Greenhouse gas emissions from agrifood systems: Global, regional and country trends, 2001 to 2023, FAOSTAT Analytical Brief 115 (October 2025). Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome. Observation year 2023. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  9. 10Crippa, M., Solazzo, E., Guizzardi, D. et al., Food systems are responsible for a third of global anthropogenic GHG emissions, Nature Food 2, 198 to 209, 2021 (open access, full text). Springer Nature. Observation year 2015. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  10. 20IPCC (ed.), Climate Change and Land: Special Report on climate change, desertification, land degradation, sustainable land management, food security, and greenhouse gas fluxes in terrestrial ecosystems, Summary for Policymakers (updated January 2020). IPCC, Geneva. Observation year 2019. Accessed 2026-11-03.back

Cite this chapter

Valadbaygi, S. (Ed.). (2026). Chapter 2: Key findings. In Global Food Risk and Resilience Report 2026: Baseline Edition, The State of the World’s Food and Agrifood Systems. (Baseline Edition 2026, Report No. NR-SECTOR-FOOD-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE) [Draft under review]. The Global Centre for Risk and Innovation (GCRI).

Every citation form of the whole report, BibTeX and RIS included, is on the edition home. Cite this report

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Sector signature

The sectors behind Global Food and Agrifood Systems.

A reading aid: the sectors the findings run through and how strongly they depend on each other.

Select corners · hover lines6 / 15 relations

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Food and its partners

Food gives nutrition to health (0.7), land conversion to biodiversity (0.6) and withdrawals and runoff to water (0.3).

W · E · I · F · H · B

Sectors
4 of 6
Relations
6 of 15
Coupling
0.46 share of total

Strongest relations in play

  • Food → Biodiversity · land conversion0.6
  • Water → Food · irrigation0.8
  • Water → Biodiversity · environmental flows0.6
  • Food → Health · nutrition0.7
Teaching values for a typical city-region, not measurements for any place. Coupling is the summed strength of the relations in play, as a share of all fifteen.
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