In 2025, South Sudan continued to face multiple, overlapping shocks and trends that worsened the humanitarian situation and increased the needs of vulnerable communities.
Hurricane Melissa, one of the most powerful storms ever recorded in the Atlantic, hit southwestern Jamaica on 28 October as a Category 5 system—the worst hurricane to hit the area since 1988—before crossing into eastern Cuba as a Category 3 the following day.
As the extent of the damage becomes clearer, the impact continues to grow in the provinces of Santiago de Cuba and Granma — the two most severely hit by Hurricane Melissa.
More than 54,000 people remain evacuated, 7,500 of them in state centers.
• One week after Hurricane Melissa passed through, more than 50 communities in the eastern region remain cut off due to flooding and infrastructure damage, according to Civil Defense reports.
As of 30 October, an estimated 1,024,500 people have been affected by flooding across 29 counties in six states. Jonglei and Unity states account for nearly 87 per cent of those impacted.
August has brought much wetter conditions across the country, improving crop and pasture conditions but also increasing flood risk and leading to expansion of flood areas.
South Sudan faces an escalating food crisis, driven by ongoing conflict, frequent climate shocks and economic instability. These overlapping challenges have deepened food insecurity across the country, putting millions at risk and straining already limited resources.
UNOCHA reports that over 9.3 million children are expected to suffer from high levels of acute malnutrition between June 2024 and May 2025 in Burundi, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan and Uganda.
The Food Security and Nutrition Monitoring System (FSNMS) is a nationwide inter-agency assessment exercise established to monitor key Food Security and Nutrition indicators at household and individual levels with the goal of informing humanitarian response in South Sudan
