By Sunday Elijah,
President Julius Maada Bio of Sierra Leone and Chair of the ECOWAS Authority has urged the international community to recognize food security as a key element of peace and security.
Speaking at a high-level UN Security Council debate on “Conflict-Related Food Insecurity,” President Bio warned that hunger is increasingly being used as a weapon of war. He stressed that deliberately starving civilians constitutes a war crime under international law.
The President highlighted conflicts in Gaza, Sudan, Haiti, Ukraine, and the Sahel, which continue to destroy food systems, livelihoods, and worsen humanitarian crises. He described starvation as a “slow, silent, corrosive” form of violence that fuels instability and renewed conflict.
President Bio outlined three main messages: starvation is not collateral damage but a crime; food insecurity drives conflict and must be addressed in peacebuilding; and sustainable peace requires investment in agriculture, markets, and human capital, especially for women and youth.
He presented Sierra Leone’s Feed Salone Initiative as a national example. The programme focuses on production, resilience, markets and value chains, and human capital. It aims to boost productivity, reduce import dependence, and build climate-smart systems for stable livelihoods.
At the regional level, President Bio highlighted ECOWAS efforts to link food security with peacebuilding, early warning, and trade frameworks. He pointed to the expansion of the ECOWAS Food Security Reserve and the ECOWARN early warning system.
He called on the UN Security Council to take six concrete actions: protect food systems in conflict zones, institutionalize early-warning mechanisms, safeguard humanitarian access, hold perpetrators accountable for starvation crimes, link peacebuilding finance to agriculture, and empower women and youth in food value chains.
President Bio emphasized that Africa seeks partnership, not sympathy, highlighting the continent’s vast arable land and youth-driven innovation. He stressed that preventing future conflicts requires making food security central to peace and security policies.
He concluded with a call to action: “Ensure that no child is starved into submission, no harvest held hostage, and no community driven to violence by hunger,” urging nations to act in line with international law and moral responsibility.
