In this year’s GHI report, 136 countries met the criteria for inclusion in the GHI, but 11 had insufficient data to allow for calculation of a 2023 GHI score. To address this gap and give a preliminary picture of hunger in the countries with missing data, provisional designations of the severity of hunger were determined based on several known factors (see Table below):
- those GHI indicator values that are available,
- the country’s last known GHI severity designation,
- the country’s last known prevalence of undernourishment,
- the prevalence of undernourishment for the subregion in which the country is located, and/or
- assessment of the relevant findings of the 2021, 2022, and 2023 editions of the Global Report on Food Crises (FSIN and GNAFC 2021, 2022, 2023).
For some countries, data are missing because of violent conflict or political unrest (FAO et al. 2017; Martin-Shields and Stojetz 2019), which are strong predictors of hunger and undernutrition. The countries with missing data may often be those facing the greatest hunger burdens. Of the three countries provisionally designated as alarming—Burundi, Somalia, and South Sudan—it is possible that with complete data, one or more of them would fall into the extremely alarming category. However, without sufficient information to confirm that this is the case, we have conservatively categorized each of these countries as alarming.
In some cases even a provisional severity designation could not be determined, such as if the country had never previously had a prevalence of undernourishment value, GHI score, or GHI designation since the first GHI report was published in 2006. In the cases of Somalia and South Sudan, data were unavailable for two out of four GHI indicators. However, a review of the relevant information in the 2021, 2022, and 2023 editions of the Global Report on Food Crises as well as consultations with experts on food and nutrition insecurity in these two countries made clear that designations of alarming were justified.
