Food crises in the world got worse last year, according to a network of researchers (somehow, loosely?) affiliated with the UN. According to Bloomberg:

Food crises are increasingly determined by complex causes such as conflict, extreme climatic shocks and high prices of staple foods, often happening at the same time, the UN’s Food & Agriculture Organization, World Food Programme and EU said in a report Thursday.

Conflict will remain a major driver of food insecurity in Africa, Asia and the Middle East, while drought is likely to worsen crop and livestock output, increasing food insecurity in countries such as Somalia, Ethiopia and Kenya, they said…

Extreme climate events –- mainly drought — were the main triggers of food crises in 23 countries, while conflict continued to be the main driver of acute food insecurity in 18 nations. The report defines acute food insecurity as hunger so severe that it poses an immediate threat to lives or livelihoods.

Dig a little deeper and it sounds like El Nino played a role in intense droughts in many parts of the world. I know El Nino happens with or without climate change, but climate change may arguably be making it worse. War may or may not be caused by climate change, but societies devastated by war are going to have a lot more trouble adapting to extreme weather and changes in water supplies than ones that are not. Food is the nexus of water, energy, and ecosystem services, so if we are exceeding the world’s carrying capacity this is where the signal is likely to show up, both in a long, steady climb in prices and in decreased capacity to recover from extreme events. The poor are always going to feel these effects first and most acutely.