Reconstruction
In mid-2024, Zamzam, a vast camp for internally displaced people south of El Fasher in North Darfur, became the first place in Sudan where the IPC Famine Review Committee found famine during the war that began in April 2023. The committee judged it plausible that famine was occurring in July and would persist through October. A second review classified Zamzam, Abu Shouk and Al Salam camps in famine for October–November 2024 and projected the classification through May 2025.
This was not simply a failed harvest. Zamzam’s population had expanded rapidly as fighting around El Fasher drove approximately 150,000–200,000 additional people toward the camp. Many established residents depended on daily labor and market purchases rather than maintaining large grain stores. Conflict cut employment, restricted movement, disrupted cultivation and obstructed humanitarian and commercial traffic. Rain made unpaved roads still harder to use. The sole food-aid delivery reaching Zamzam early in 2024 reportedly covered less than five percent of its population.
The shrinking market still offered foods including asida, usually a thick sorghum porridge, bread, local vegetables, oil and sugar. Sorghum and millet—the principal local staples—became scarce and extraordinarily expensive as regional production and trade deteriorated. Families reduced meals and dietary variety. Contemporary humanitarian accounts reported people eating ambaz, an oilseed-processing residue normally used as animal feed; reports differ over whether particular supplies came from groundnuts, sesame or other oilseeds, so its precise composition should not be generalized. Therapeutic food was used for severely malnourished children, but deliveries remained inadequate and unpredictable.
Food scarcity interacted with unsafe water, disease and the collapse of health services. IPC famine classification does not mean that every resident experienced identical conditions. It indicates an area-level convergence of extreme household food deprivation, acute malnutrition and elevated mortality. Because access and population estimates were exceptionally uncertain, reviewers combined surveys with market information, humanitarian records, displacement estimates, satellite evidence and expert consultation. The classification was therefore a rigorous analytical determination, not a complete census of hunger or deaths.
Conditions worsened again in February 2025, when shelling destroyed Zamzam’s central market and forced the World Food Programme to suspend distributions after its partners evacuated. From 11 to 13 April, the Rapid Support Forces and allied forces attacked and took control of the camp. A later United Nations fact-finding report estimated that more than 400,000 inhabitants were displaced, many toward Tawila or El Fasher, while camp facilities were burned or destroyed.
Zamzam demonstrates how modern famine can emerge despite food existing elsewhere: violence can sever households from fields, wages, markets, transport and relief simultaneously. Its lasting consequence was not a new cuisine but another mass displacement. Emergency food stocks, mobile storage, therapeutic feeding and cross-border supply routes through Chad became vital, while the destruction of the camp transferred extreme food, water and health pressures to already strained host communities elsewhere in North Darfur.
Historical context
Sudan’s war between the Sudanese Armed Forces and Rapid Support Forces had continued since April 15, 2023, producing one of the world’s largest displacement emergencies. During the June–September 2024 lean season, approximately 25.6 million people in Sudan were estimated to face IPC Phase 3 or worse acute food insecurity, including about 755,000 in Phase 5 Catastrophe. Zamzam lay roughly 12–15 kilometres south of besieged El Fasher and expanded to at least 500,000 inhabitants as displaced families arrived. National cereal production had fallen sharply, while conflict in Darfur disrupted farming and trade with the rest of Sudan and across the Chadian border.
Evidence
Written sources
StrongIPC Famine Review Committee reports, humanitarian operational records and a United Nations fact-finding report directly document the famine classifications, market and aid disruption, and subsequent mass displacement.
Food identification
ModerateThe IPC review directly identifies asida, bread, vegetables, oil and sugar in Zamzam's market, while humanitarian accounts identify sorghum, millet and ambaz. The oilseed source and composition of ambaz varied among reports.
Dating
StrongThe July and December 2024 IPC reviews define the classification periods, and contemporary operational and investigative reports date the February and April 2025 disruptions.
Preparation method
LimitedAsida is identified as sorghum porridge and ambaz as oil-processing residue, but household recipes, processing conditions and actual portions consumed during the famine were not systematically recorded.
Geographic attribution
StrongInstitutional reports consistently locate Zamzam camp approximately 12–15 kilometres south of El Fasher in North Darfur.
Historical interpretation
ModerateThe causal role of conflict, displacement, market breakdown and restricted assistance is strongly supported. Exact population, mortality and consumption figures remain uncertain because access, communications and representative data collection were severely constrained.
Sources
- 1.Oleg Bilukha; Nicholas Haan; Daniel Maxwell; Andrew Seal; Jose Lopez (2024). Famine Review Committee: Combined Review of the FEWS NET IPC Compatible Analysis for IDP Camps in El Fasher, North Darfur and the IPC Sudan Technical Working Group Analysis of Zamzam Camp. Integrated Food Security Phase Classification. www.ipcinfo.org/fileadmin/user_upload/ipcinfo/doModern synthesis
- 2.Oleg Bilukha; Nicholas Haan; Peter Hailey; Daniel Maxwell; Andrew Seal; Jose Lopez; Luca Russo (2024). Famine Review Committee: Sudan, December 2024—Conclusions and Recommendations. Integrated Food Security Phase Classification. www.ipcinfo.org/fileadmin/user_upload/ipcinfo/doModern synthesis
- 3.Médecins Sans Frontières (2024). Food Must Be Delivered to People Starved by Blockade in Zamzam Camp. Médecins Sans Frontières. www.msf.org/food-must-be-delivered-people-starveHistorical primary source
- 4.World Food Programme (2025). WFP Forced to Pause Food Distributions in Sudan's Zamzam Camp as Fighting Intensifies. United Nations in Sudan. sudan.un.org/en/289884-wfp-forced-pause-food-disHistorical primary source
- 5.United Nations Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in Sudan (2025). Forced Displacement in North Darfur Overwhelms Aid Operations and Increases Civilian Vulnerability. United Nations in Sudan. sudan.un.org/en/293004-forced-displacement-northHistorical primary source
- 6.United Nations Human Rights Council Independent International Fact-Finding Mission for the Sudan (2025). Sudan: A War of Atrocities. United Nations, A/HRC/60/22. digitallibrary.un.org/record/4091791/files/A_HRCModern synthesis
Limitations
- moderatedescription
The phrase 'contributes to archaeological population' is not supported by the evidence. This is a contemporary documented crisis based on IPC analysis, surveys, operational reporting, satellite information and humanitarian investigations, not archaeological evidence.
- minorcoordinates
The supplied point is an acceptable broad location for the El Fasher area but appears closer to El Fasher than to Zamzam itself. Institutional sources place Zamzam approximately 12–15 kilometres south of the city, so a camp-specific point would normally have a latitude nearer 13.5° N.
