The Southern African nation of Namibia is planning to butcher hundreds of its most majestic animals to feed some of the 1.4 million people — nearly half the country — who are at risk of acute food insecurity amid the worst drought in a century.

The plan, under which the country will kill 723 wild animals, including 83 elephants, to feed people, is “necessary” and “in line with our constitutional mandate where our natural resources are used for the benefit of Namibian citizens,” the country’s ministry of environment, forestry and tourism said in a news release.

This strategy is not unheard-of. “Well-managed, sustainable harvesting of healthy wild animal populations can be a precious source of food for communities,” Rose Mwebaza, the director of the United Nations Environment Programme’s Africa Office, wrote in an email.

Much of Southern Africa is being affected by drought. More than 30 million people across the region are affected, the U.N. World Food Program said in June.

Droughts are common in Southern Africa, and the region has experienced several in the past decade, including from 2018 to 2021, Benjamin Suarato, a spokesman for the U.S. Agency for International Development, said in an email. But this one has been especially devastating and widespread across the region, said Juliane Zeidler, the country director of the World Wildlife Fund in Namibia.

“There is no food,” Dr. Zeidler said on Thursday. “There is no food for people and there is no food for animals.”