The United Nations published the 2026 edition of the State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI) on July 21, reporting that an estimated 645 million people faced hunger globally in 2025, 14 million fewer than in 2024 and 43 million fewer than in 2022. The figure marks a third consecutive year of improvement after hunger surged during the COVID-19 pandemic, but the global total remains higher than in 2019. The prevalence of undernourishment stood at 7.8% of the world's population in 2025, down from 8.1% in 2024 and 8.6% in 2022 (Al Jazeera, 2026-07-21).

The report is jointly prepared by five UN agencies — the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), UNICEF, the World Food Programme (WFP), and the World Health Organization (WHO) — and is hosted on the FAO Open Knowledge Repository. The 2026 edition centers on the theme "Understanding and Addressing the High Cost of a Healthy Diet." The FAO presented the findings at a special event during the High-Level Political Forum (HLPF) on July 14 and hosted a dedicated launch webcast.

Africa remains the epicenter of global hunger. In 2025, an estimated 309 million people on the continent were undernourished, representing one in five Africans and nearly half of the world's hungry population. The prevalence of hunger in Africa edged down from 20.3% in 2024 to 20% in 2025, but population growth meant the absolute number of hungry people continued to rise. Asia recorded 292 million undernourished (6% of its population), while Latin America and the Caribbean accounted for 32 million (4.8%).

The cost and affordability of nutritious food is a central concern of this year's report. The global cost of a healthy diet reached $4.28 per day in purchasing power parity terms in 2025, up from $3.44 in 2021 and $2.94 in 2017. Despite this rising cost, the number of people unable to afford a healthy diet declined from 2.97 billion (37.4% of the global population) in 2021 to 2.69 billion (32.7%) in 2025. Asia has 1.4 billion people unable to afford a healthy diet, 29% of its population. Africa has 1.03 billion, nearly two-thirds of the continental population. In Latin America and the Caribbean, about 172 million people (26%) cannot afford a healthy diet. Europe and North America have 77.5 million (7%), and Oceania has 2.3 million (5%).

Looking forward, the UN projects the global number of undernourished people will fall by roughly 20% by 2030, leaving between 510 million and 520 million still facing hunger. Fifty-six percent of them are projected to live in Africa, reinforcing the continental concentration of food insecurity even as global totals decline.

The report also flagged a significant near-term risk to this trajectory. It warned that the 2026 US-Israel war on Iran could undermine progress on hunger reduction, particularly in Africa and Asia. The conflict's potential to disrupt food systems in regions already bearing the heaviest burden of undernourishment introduces a layer of geopolitical uncertainty into projections that otherwise trend, cautiously, in the right direction.

The broader context here is one of fragile, uneven recovery. Three consecutive years of declining global hunger is an encouraging signal after the pandemic-era surge, but the recovery has not restored the pre-COVID baseline. And the headline global decline masks a critical divergence: Africa's share of the world's hungry is growing, both in absolute numbers and as a proportion of the global total. The projected 56% concentration in Africa by 2030 would represent a deepening of an already severe regional imbalance.

The affordability data tells a parallel story. While 280 million fewer people cannot afford a healthy diet than in 2021, the cost of that diet has risen 24% over the same period. The improvement in affordability is therefore being driven by income gains and food-access mechanisms, not by cheaper food. Should those income gains stall or food prices accelerate further, the affordability gap could widen again. This is the structural vulnerability the 2026 SOFI report implicitly underscores: progress is real but contingent on economic conditions that remain fragile and on a geopolitical landscape that, as the Iran warning makes clear, can shift abruptly.

For policymakers and humanitarian actors operating in food-insecure regions, the report's signal is twofold. The long-term trajectory is improving, but the margin is thin, the regional concentration is intensifying, and the risk of exogenous shock is present. The gap between 645 million hungry today and the 2030 projection of 510-520 million is achievable on current trends, but it is not wide enough to absorb a major disruption without reversing course.