WFP to further cut aid to Yemen, threatening vital food assistance

The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has announced Friday that it is facing a deeper funding crisis for its Yemen operations from the end of September onward. This will force WFP to make difficult decisions about further cuts to its food assistance programs across the country in the coming months. The UN agency has already reduced live-saving programs. 

The current level of hunger in Yemen is unprecedented. An estimated 2.2 million children in Yemen are acutely malnourished, including nearly 540,000 children under the age of five suffering from severe acute malnutrition. The rate of child malnutrition is one of the highest in the world, and the nutrition situation is improving only slightly.

However, this progress is extremely fragile and could reverse quickly if aid agencies are forced to reduce or suspend programs due to funding shortfalls. 

The UN agency said all of its major programs in Yemen will be impacted, totaling 17.7 million interventions in the first half of this year. Without new funding, WFP expects that as many as 3 million people in the North could be impacted and 1.4 million beneficiaries in the South. 

WFP has resources to cover 6.6 million in the North and 2.2 million in the South. Yemen will remain one of WFP's largest food assistance operations worldwide, but these cuts represent a significant reduction to the programs in the country. 13.1 million beneficiaries across Yemen are currently receiving food rations. 

"We are confronted with the incredibly tough reality of making decisions to take food from the hungry to feed the starving while millions of Yemenis continue to rely on us for survival. We do not take this decision lightly and are fully cognizant of the suffering these cuts will cause" said Richard Ragan, WFP's Yemen Representative.

17 million people in Yemen experience high levels of acute food insecurity, driven mainly by conflict, economic decline and climate change. This number includes 6.1 million people in emergency levels of hunger. 

WFP already made cuts to malnutrition prevention activities in Yemen, which previously targeted 1.4 million people. Because of these resource constraints, the UN agency said it is only able to assist 128,000 of the 2.4 million children and pregnant and breastfeeding women and girls originally targeted.

While the life-saving Moderate Acute Malnutrition (MAM) treatment program remains operational, WFP has already had to cut 60 percent of the planned program. The funding shortages are coming at a time when more people become severely malnourished.

Due to funding constraints, WFP expects to be able to provide assistance to only 1.8 million children as part of its School Feeding program for this academic year, a reduction from the initially intended target of 3.2 million children.

WFP's operations are entirely dependent on voluntary contributions. For the next six months, WFP requires a total of US$1.05 billion in funding. So far, only 28 percent of these funds have been secured.

In a related development this week, the UN Special Envoy to Yemen, Hans Grundberg, briefed UN Security Council members Wednesday on recent developments in the country, and on his mediation efforts between the warring parties, the Government of Yemen and the Ansar Allah movement, including his ongoing engagements with regional member States like Saudi Arabia and Oman.

Despite the expiration of the truce in October 2022, hostilities on the front lines have not returned to pre-truce levels, but intermittent fighting has continued; Grundberg therefore called on all parties to refrain from escalatory rhetoric.

“Against this backdrop, there have been public threats to return to war. This rhetoric is not conducive to maintaining a fruitful mediation environment. I call on the parties to refrain from escalatory rhetoric and to continue to use and build on dialogue channels established under the truce through the Military Coordination Committee to de-escalate incidents”, he said.

The UN Special Envoy noted that both sides continue to display general willingness to seek solutions, but this still needs to be translated into concrete steps.

Also briefing the Council, Edem Wosornu, Director of Operations and Advocacy in the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), said that in 2023, humanitarians aim to provide support to more than 17 million people in need across Yemen.  

However, this work is being severely hampered by critical funding shortages. Wosornu also commented the suspension of WFP’s malnutrition prevention activities across Yemen.

“The cost of inaction for these children, and for many other people across the country, is steep,” she said, urging the international community not to lose sight of the progress made in improving humanitarian outcomes across Yemen and how easily this could be reversed.

In the first half of 2023, 189 aid agencies in Yemen - 9 UN agencies, 53 international NGOs, and 127 national NGOs - provided assistance to an average of 9.8 million people monthly. 

However, relief agencies face a funding crisis that has jeopardized the response. As of August 19, the humanitarian response plan for Yemen requiring $4.34 billion is only 31 percent ($1.36 billion) funded.

"I call on donor countries to act urgently to prevent a catastrophic outcome," the Humanitarian Coordinator for Yemen, David Gressly, said in a statement Saturday. On the occasion of World Humanitarian Day, the Humanitarian Coordinator also reaffirmed the UN and relief agencies’ commitment to the people of Yemen.

More than eight years of armed conflict in Yemen have caused tens of thousands of civilian casualties and forced millions to flee, making Yemen one of the world’s largest humanitarian crises. Nearly 6 million people have been forced to flee their homes since the beginning of the civil war in 2015. 4.5 million people are internally displaced inside Yemen.

Despite a six-month ceasefire in 2022, the suffering of the country's population remains immense, mainly due to the deteriorating economic situation and the collapse of basic services. Moreover, Yemen is at the forefront of the global climate crisis, as recurring natural disasters such as floods and severe droughts threaten people's lives, safety and well-being.

The United Nations estimates that 21.6 million people will need humanitarian assistance in 2023. Among them are 11 million children in dire need of humanitarian aid. In 2023, aid organizations plan to reach 17.3 million people in need, if they have enough funds.

Further information

Full text: WFP facing critical funding shortage in Yemen threatening vital food assistance, WFP press release, published August 18, 2023
https://www.wfp.org/news/wfp-facing-critical-funding-shortage-yemen-threatening-vital-food-assistance

Full text: Amid Fragile Humanitarian Situation, Inclusive Peace Process Only Pathway to Permanently End War in Yemen, Many Speakers Tell Security Council, UN Security Council, press release, published August 16, 2023
https://press.un.org/en/2023/sc15383.doc.htm