ADDIS ABABA, April 8 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) said Monday that 8.86 million Ethiopians need urgent humanitarian assistance in 2019.
"The 8.86 million people were affected by adverse humanitarian outcomes including chronic food insecurity, malnutrition, displacement and sickness from infectious diseases," the UNOCHA said in a statement.
Conflict, climate shocks and disease outbreaks are behind the humanitarian needs, it said.
In March, the Ethiopian government and development partners including UNOCHA said 1.3 billion U.S. dollars is needed to address food and non-food emergency needs of 8.3 million people in 2019.
Ethiopia was spared significant climate-related calamities last year, but spikes in conflict-induced displacements, which led to a near doubling of internally displaced population, contributed to high humanitarian response needs in 2019.
