The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) is a common global scale for classifying the severity and magnitude of food insecurity and malnutrition. It is the result of a partnership of various organizations at the global, regional, and country levels dedicated to developing and maintaining the highest possible quality in food security and nutrition analysis. Increasingly, the IPC is the international standard for classifying food insecurity and malnutrition. The IPC is a ‘big picture’ classification focusing on providing information that is consistently required by stakeholders around the world for strategic decision-making. Nuanced information may also be needed to inform particular decisions or answer certain questions. The IPC provides the essential information needed in a wide range of contexts in consistent, comparable and accountable ways.

The IPC global partnership is comprised of 15 organizations and inter-governmental institutions including Action Against Hunger (AAH), CARE International, Comité Permanent Inter-Etats de Lutte Contre la Sécheresse au Sahel (Permanent Interstate Committee for Drought Control in the Sahel) (CILSS), Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET), the Global Food Security Cluster, the Global Nutrition Cluster, Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the European Commission, Oxford Committee for Famine Relief (Oxfam), Southern African Development Community (SADC), Save the Children, Sistema de la Integración Centroamericana (Central American Integration System) (SICA), World Food Programme (WFP) and United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).