The disruptions to trade unfolding in the Strait of Hormuz have rippled through the Horn of Africa (HoA)—here comprising Djibouti, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, and Uganda—further eroding the region's already fragile baseline of stability and food security.
Following the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russia–Ukraine war, this latest shock is not the primary driver of food insecurity or instability in the region.
Insecurity and instability have long shaped the development trajectory in the region, stretching from the famines in Ethiopia and Somalia in the 1980s and 1990s to the war-related hunger currently unfolding in Sudan. Crises originating in distant places are often transmitted through global markets and supply chains, placing additional pressure on regional food systems, vulnerable economies, and already strained governance structures. The Strait of Hormuz disruption is thus merely the latest entry in a long ledger, one that underscores a longstanding policy dilemma in the region, in which the relationship between food insecurity and instability perpetuates a reciprocal dynamic. Food insecurity can aggravate political instability and conflict, while insecurity further disrupts food production, markets, and access to food.
As the US-Israel-Iran war unfolded, the African Development Bank (AfdB) and UNDP cautioned in a joint brief that while the world focuses on oil and gas, fertiliser shortages pose a more urgent risk to African economies. (AfDB et al. 2026). Against a backdrop of protracted conflict, five consecutive years of worsening acute food insecurity through 2024, and dependence on imported food and agricultural inputs (FSIN and GNAFC 2024), the trade disruption is not an exceptional geopolitical event or an isolated challenge, but a structural reality best understood as a stress test of the region’s food security and political stability.
Food Systems as the Transmission Mechanism
To understand how these external disruptions translate into food insecurity, it is necessary to examine the structure of the region's food system.
Food systems in the Horn of Africa are closely connected to the Middle East through trade in food and agricultural inputs. Ethiopia and Kenya rank among Africa’s largest fertilizer importers (Ecofin Agency 2025); together with Sudan, they source fertilizers from suppliers across North Africa and the Gulf, including Egypt, Oman, and Saudi Arabia (World Bank 2026d).
At the same time, HoA countries export meat, pulses, dried and fresh fruits to Middle Eastern markets (World Bank 2026c). The region’s exposure therefore extends beyond imports: the current conflict has disrupted Kenyan tea shipments through the Strait of Hormuz and related Red Sea routes, while airspace closures and higher freight costs have sharply curtailed meat exports to Middle Eastern markets (Nzilani 2026; Hlatshwayo 2026). By reducing incomes for farmers, pastoralists, and traders, as well as foreign-exchange earnings for affected countries, these disruptions can further weaken households’ purchasing power and countries’ capacity to finance essential imports.
Structural Vulnerabilities
The ripple effects of the current crisis are reaching a region already facing multiple overlapping vulnerabilities, including conflict, displacement, climate stress, and restricted humanitarian access across Ethiopia, Somalia, Sudan, and South Sudan (OCHA 2026b; Gomo 2026). For Sudan, disrupted shipping routes added weeks to delivery times and increased the cost of humanitarian food supplies (WFP 2026c). These external pressures compounded conflict-related disruptions within the country, where fighting continued to restrict access to fields and inputs and limit agricultural production across Greater Darfur and Greater Kordofan (IPC 2026f).
‟…while the world focuses on oil and gas, fertilizer shortages pose a more urgent risk to African economies.”
Ethiopia faces a different but related convergence of pressures. Ongoing conflict in Amhara and parts of Tigray continues to disrupt livelihoods (WFP 2026i). While southern and southeastern areas continue to face the effects of the severe 2020–2022 drought, marked by five consecutive below-average rainy seasons through the October–December 2022 season (FEWS NET 2023a). Recent fuel shortages have added another layer of strain, increasing transport constraints and disrupting market activity (FEWS NET 2026b). In Somalia, these external pressures are being absorbed by households already weakened by drought, insecurity, displacement, and declining humanitarian assistance, with higher fuel, transport, and imported food prices reducing what families can afford (IPC 2026d). Kenya illustrates yet another pathway: higher fuel and commodity prices have particularly affected urban households (World Bank 2026f) and spilled into public discontent, with fuel price increases triggering a nationwide public transport strike and protests (Reuters 2026a).
A Way Forward
While the crisis triggered by the US–Israel– Iran war will eventually come to some form of resolution, the structural vulnerabilities it has laid bare may not. Unless governments reduce excessive external dependency and strengthen the resilience of regional food systems, future geopolitical crises, wherever they originate, are likely to worsen food insecurity and heighten existing risks to political stability and security across the Horn of Africa.
Increasingly, governments in the Horn of Africa are moving beyond crisis response toward structural interventions designed to strengthen domestic stability and address persistent external shocks. Several recent initiatives illustrate this shift.
In Ethiopia, investments in domestic fertilizer production, agricultural transformation, and industrial development are intended to reduce dependence on imported inputs and strengthen economic self-reliance (Addis Standard 2026). Elsewhere, Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania are discussing a joint regional refinery intended to reduce East Africa’s dependence on imported refined fuel and exposure to global supply shocks (Government of Kenya 2026; Reuters 2026c).
These national efforts must now be matched by regional contingency planning, coordinated through institutions such as the Intergovernmental Authority on Development and the East African Community. Regional preparedness should encompass the prepositioning of essential agricultural supplies and strengthening of logistics capacity at strategic ports such as Djibouti and Mombasa. It should also safeguard agricultural production in key food-producing regions such as Kordofan, Darfur, Tigray, and Lower Shabelle. Early warning systems, including those of the African Union (AU), the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), and the East African Community (EAC), should be linked to trade policies under the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), so shocks trigger action before food insecurity worsens.