Three straight years of below-average rainfall have left some 2.6 million people in northern Kenya struggling to find enough to eat. As crops and livestock are lost to the severe drought, food prices have quadrupled and malnutrition is on the rise.

Timothy Cham and his wife, Abang Otong, escaped a brutal war in South Sudan. They are among the 1% of refugees worldwide who have a chance to resettle in another country.  They arrived in the United States eight months ago to resettle in Baltimore, MD with support from the International Rescue Committee. Both Timothy and Abang are working in Baltimore, and their sons Akway and Emmanuel are doing very well in school.

Drought in northern Kenya has left some 2.6 million people struggling to find enough to eat. Women and girls in Turkana County are being exploited in exchange for money to buy food. The International Rescue Committee is seeing an increase in violence against women, early and forced marriage, and women and girls engaging in transactional sex in order to procure food for their families as the region is gripped by near-famine.

According to a recent survey by the International Rescue Committee and SocialSphere, Inc. very few Americans are aware of the near famine affecting 20 million people in Africa and the Middle East. But once they are informed, it immediately rises to a top global concern. In this video IRC president David Miliband visits refugee settlements in South Sudan and Uganda to hear the stories of people impacted by this crisis.

Ruth,14, was forced to flee her home in northeast Nigeria due to Boko Haram violence and went without school for three years. Now because of the International Rescue Committee and ECHO Children of Peace Initiative she attends school again.

Uganda has received its millionth refugee from South Sudan, its neighbor consumed by civil war. Uganda could have tried to keep the refugees out, regarding them as a potential burden on a still-developing country. Instead, Uganda embraced the refugees as brothers and sisters who need help and a chance to start a new life somewhere safe.

When conflict and crisis strike, children are hurt the most. Today, there are 65 million displaced people globally, half of whom are children. Research shows that the effects of toxic stress can be reduced, and even reversed, if children have access to high quality education. This sets them up for success, not only in school, but in life.

Hundreds of thousands of children have been forced to flee their home by the battle against ISIS in Iraq. Watch and share Arwa’s story.  Arwa fled her home in Mosul. Today she attends the IRC’s center for children where she practices mindfulness to deal with the trauma she has experienced. The center, supported by EU humanitarian aid (ECHO) also gives her a place to play, learn and to just be a child again.

It's Jori's first week of kindergarten in Dallas, Texas. Her big brother Majed just started Third Grade. Their family arrived as refugees from war-torn Syria nearly two years ago. Jori and Majed's mother, Bothina, was a teacher back home. She and her husband Tamam are glad their children are safe and in a good school, and now have a brighter future in America. Learn more about their family's new life.

Asho fled conflict-ravaged Somalia in 2008 after she was raped and saw her neighbor killed in front of her for trying to protect her. Six years ago Asho and her children, who now live in Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya, learned that they would have a chance to resettle in the United States.