FAO launches emergency seed distribution campaign to farming families in Sudan

July 1, 2025 (PEN) The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) has launched a massive emergency seed distribution campaign targeting 1.5 million farming households, representing about 7.5 million people, in 17 of Sudan's 18 states, in an effort to address the worsening food security crisis caused by conflict and violence.

The campaign is focused on West Darfur, where more than 750,000 people—more than half the population—are experiencing crisis-level hunger or worse due to conflict and food insecurity. The campaign is providing sorghum, millet, chickpea, and pigeonpea seeds, which families urgently need to plant the 2025 main crop season.

Half of Sudan's population, 24.6 million people, are experiencing high levels of acute food insecurity, according to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) analysis issued in December 2024. Famine has been declared in five areas, with an estimated 637,000 people affected, and is expected to spread to five more areas.

The FAO said the campaign enables families to produce their own food and rebuild their livelihoods, and is one of the most efficient and impactful humanitarian interventions in the crisis. Since June 2025, FAO and its partners have distributed approximately 1,000 metric tons of sorghum, millet, and okra seeds in several states, in addition to purchasing more than 3,000 metric tons of crop seeds to support approximately 330,000 families.

However, the response faces a severe funding shortfall, with FAO needing more than $156.7 million to reach more than 14 million people by 2025, while only $4.1 million has been secured, leaving a massive funding gap of $152.6 million.

FAO Director-General Qu Dongyu emphasized that the seed distribution represents "the growth of hope in food," and that action must be taken quickly to save lives, warning that the humanitarian crisis could worsen without urgent and extensive humanitarian intervention.