U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for immediate action Tuesday to avoid a “global food emergency,” saying more than 820 million people are hungry, some 144 million children under 5 years old are stunted, and the COVID-19 pandemic is making things worse.

He said there is more than enough food to feed the world’s 7.8 billion people but “our food systems are failing.”

The U.N. chief launched a policy briefing on the Impact of COVID-19 on Food Security and Nutrition, which said before the pandemic more than 820 million people were “chronically food insecure,” with 135 million at crisis levels or worse.

“That number could nearly double before the end of the year due to the impacts of COVID-19,” the briefing said.

Guterres said some 49 million extra people may fall into extreme poverty due to the pandemic and its impact.

Noting forecasts of a global economic downturn this year, he warned that every percentage point drop in global GDP means an additional 700,000 stunted children.

According to the briefing, measures to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic are affecting global food supply chains.

“Border restrictions and lockdowns are, for example, slowing harvests in some parts of the world, leaving millions of seasonal workers without livelihoods, while also constraining transport of food to markets,” the U.N. briefing said.

It pointed to the forced closure of meat processing plants and food markets in many locations because of serious COVID-19 outbreaks.

Agnes Kalibata, the U.N. special envoy to a Food Systems Summit scheduled in 2021, said “from the U.S. to India, produce is rotting in the fields as lockdowns keep people from harvesting and planting crops.”

“That means less income for desperately hungry people to buy food and less food available, at higher prices,” she said in a statement. “And this is happening across the world.”

(SD-Agencies)