The Government of Denmark, in partnership with the Government of Germany, the European Union and the United Nations, is hosting a high-level humanitarian event on the Central Sahel.
The Central Sahel, a region including Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger is the epicenter of one of the world’s fastest growing humanitarian crises. In less than two years, violence and insecurity have pushed 6.6 million people to acute hunger levels, and 1.4 million people into internal displacement—a twentyfold increase. The COVID-19 pandemic has pushed an additional 6 million people into extreme poverty, with 4.8 million people – most of them children – in need of urgent nutrition assistance.
The UN will be represented by Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Mark Lowcock who will deliver remarks and take part in in a press conference on 20 October. The event itself will be held virtually and will be live streamed on UN WebTV at http://webtv.un.org.
At the pledging conference, humanitarian organizations will seek US$2.4 billion to provide emergency assistance until the end of 2021.
The high-level event will feature a ministerial round table that will take place on Tuesday, 20 October 2020, which follows up on a virtual senior officials’ meeting held on 8 September that focused on operational lessons learned and forward-looking plans relating to humanitarian action, development and peace efforts, including special attention to the impact and consequences of COVID-19.
https://www.unocha.org/centralsahel2020
