More than 600 people have died since June in Nigeria's deadliest floods in a decade, forcing 1.3 million people to flee their homes so far, according to a new report from the country's authorities. In 2012, the floods left 363 dead and some 2.1 million displaced.
Since the start of the rainy season, many regions of Africa's most populous country have been devastated by these exceptional floods, leading national authorities to fear worsening food insecurity and inflation.
"Unfortunately, more than 603 lives have been lost" and another 2,407 people have been injured in the floods, Nigeria's Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs said on Twitter on Sunday.
The death toll has risen "astronomically" as many Nigerian states failed to prepare for the heavy rains, the ministry said. More than 82,000 homes and 110,000 hectares of farmland were also completely destroyed, the government added.
The rainy season usually begins in June, but the floods have been particularly deadly since August, according to the National Emergency Agency (Nema). In turn, they reported that heavy rains are expected again in Nigeria in the coming weeks, raising fears of further damage.
Humanitarian Affairs Minister Sadiya Umar Farouq has called for the evacuation of people living along the rivers, especially in the Anambra, Bayelsa, Cross River, Delta and Rivers regions, as the risk of floods is very high.
In particular, much of sub-Saharan Africa is affected by the climate crisis and many of its economies are dealing with the repercussions of the war in Europe, between Russia and Ukraine.
In Nigeria, a country of some 215 million people, rice farmers have warned that this year's devastating floods could push up prices as rice imports are banned by the country's government to protect and boost local production. .
According to a joint report published in September by the World Food Program (WFP) and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), Nigeria is already among the six countries in the world that face a risk of high levels of catastrophic famine.
