Conflict and protracted crises in a handful of countries in the Near East and North Africa are hamstringing efforts to eradicate hunger in the region by 2030, according to a new FAO report. The 2017 edition of the Regional Overview of Food Security and Nutrition in the Near East and North Africa (NENA) highlights in particular how an ongoing intensification of violence is opening a wide "hunger gap" between countries being affected by conflicts and those that are not. In NENA countries directly impacted by conflict, 27.2 percent of all people were chronically hungry - or undernourished - during the 2014-16 period. That's six times higher than the share of the population that was undernourished in countries not affected by strife (4.6 percent, on average). Meanwhile, "severe food insecurity" - another metric used by FAO to measure hunger - in conflict-affected countries now is double that in non-conflict countries.