Drought from El Nino causing southern Africa’s worst hunger crisis in decades

(Themba Hadebe/AP)

Months of drought in southern Africa triggered by the El Nino weather phenomenon have had a devastating effect on more than 27 million people and caused the region’s worst hunger crisis in decades, the United Nations’ food agency said on Tuesday.

The World Food Programme (WFP) warned it could become a “full-scale human catastrophe”.