Aid agencies across the globe have identified a number of worrying systemic and intersectional trends that are exacerbating existing humanitarian crises and impacting the lives of millions.

The issues are separate from the geographical crises but impact of them and are likely to drive humanitarian needs over the coming years.

Pandemic driven poverty

COVID-19 has exposed massive inequity within countries as well as between them and the pandemic increased the percentage of people living in extreme poverty globally, ending a two-decade downward trend.

The lockdowns and layoffs, increased the rate of extreme poverty – defined as people surviving on less than $US1.90 a day – by an estimated 97 million people, from a global rate of 7.8 to 9.1 per cent.

The situation for people recently plunged into poverty may get better with time, but the economic effects are likely to be felt the longest in the parts of the world that were already suffering high levels of poverty before the pandemic.

Also, across the globe – in rich and poor countries – it is women who have been hit the hardest by economic downturns.

They are more likely than men to be employed in low-paid, precarious jobs like domestic work, food services, or the garment industry; and they are among the first to lose their jobs when cuts are made. 

Hate speech on social media

Online hate has recently had tangible consequences, including inciting mass shootings, stabbings, and bombings as well as teen suicides.

But, perhaps more worryingly, it has been used to subjugate and target populations while driving humanitarian needs, as has been the case in Myanmar and Ethiopia.

In Ethiopia, for example, there has been an increase in Facebook posts advocating ethnic violence. And, even though they’ve been flagged by Facebook’s own monitoring, many have remained active.

A similar thing has happened in Myanmar. Facebook has not been able to enforce its own ban on online support for the military, which has been accused of widespread human rights abuses since it took power in a February 2021 coup.

Election integrity is one more issue. Social media gives authoritarian governments the ability to shape narrative using paid trolls or bots and false news sites that confuse and spread disinformation.

Rising political upheaval

In places like Afghanistan, Haiti, and Myanmar, political instability and turmoil is driving humanitarian needs.

These crises present the humanitarian sector with wicked problems. In Afghanistan, the west’s withdrawal of aid in the wake of the Taliban’s takeover has tipped millions more people into food insecurity.

The February 2021 military coup in Myanmar has worsened long-simmering conflicts and ignited a nationwide civil disobedience movement, as well as armed resistance. Humanitarian access, already volatile under the quasi-civilian governments of the past decade, is now even more problematic.

Closed borders

Many western nations have effectively removed the right of people to seek asylum at their borders – and arguably committing human rights violations in the process.

These deterrence policies have turned what could be manageable movements of people into manufactured humanitarian crises at borders while reinforcing global inequality.

By far, most displaced people are hosted in their home countries or neighbouring countries.

When a country restricts access to its territory, it creates a domino effect where other countries become more reluctant to let refugees, asylum seekers, and migrants in because they know it will be difficult for them to leave.

This perpetuates a situation where fragile states bear a disproportionate amount of the responsibility and cost of caring for the displaced when often they have the least capacity to do so.

Unprecedented hunger 

Up to 283 million people are short of food across the globe, a never before reached level of hunger.

As many as 45 million people are now at risk of famine – a scale of impending disaster unseen in recent times.

Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Nigeria, South Sudan, and Yemen are among the countries most in need,

Multiple droughts in Afghanistan and southern Madagascar have eroded rural people’s ability to cope. In parts of the Horn of Africa, the rains are expected to fail again early in the new year – for the fourth season in a row.

Rising global food prices are also a deep concern. Wheat and maize increased by 38 and 40 per cent respectively in 2021, the highest levels seen in a decade.

Sharp rises in the cost of fertiliser, energy, shipping, and labour – driven by soaring gas prices and the economic recovery earlier in the year in industrialised countries – are also causing shortages and straining supply chains.

These costs are being passed on to consumers, but the pinch is more keenly felt in developing economies, where people spend a larger proportion of their incomes on food – and women are disproportionately affected.

Climate change

Aid agencies say the threats to health posed by rising temperatures are becoming clearer.

There has been an increase in the impact of infectious diseases and growing heat-related mortality as well as hunger caused by water scarcity and food insecurity.

As well as the physical damage caused by powerful storms or rising seas, climate change has a ripple effect.

This includes shifting rainfall patterns and unpredictable growing seasons as well as changing diets as yields from traditional crops become more unreliable.

Access to less nutritious food equals a greater of malnutrition, stunting, and non-communicable diseases.