GENEVA: A World Food Programme official voiced concern on Tuesday about Lebanon’s ability to feed itself, saying thousands of hectares of farmland across the country’s south has burned or been abandoned amid escalating hostilities.

“Agriculture-wise, food production-wise, (there is) extraordinary concern for Lebanon’s ability to continue to feed itself,” Matthew Hollingworth, WFP country director in Lebanon, told a Geneva press briefing, adding that harvests will not occur and that produce is rotting in fields.

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At the same briefing, World Health Organization official Ian Clarke in Beirut warned that there was a much higher risk of disease outbreaks among Lebanon’s displaced population.