YANGON (AFP) – The World Food Programme (WFP) will be forced to cut off one million people in war-torn Myanmar from its vital food aid because of “critical funding shortfalls”, it said yesterday.
The United States (US) provided the United Nations’ (UN) World Food Programme (WFP) with USD4.4 billion of its USD9.7 billion budget in 2024 but Washington’s international aid funding has been slashed under President Donald Trump.
Myanmar has been gripped by civil war following a 2021 military coup, plunging it into what the UN describes as a “polycrisis” of mutually compounding conflict, poverty and instability.
The WFP said over 15 million people in the country of 51 million are unable to meet their daily food needs, while the UN warned last year that Rakhine state in the west faces an “imminent threat of acute famine”.
“More than one million people in Myanmar will be cut off from WFP’s lifesaving food assistance starting in April due to critical funding shortfalls,” said a statement.
“These cuts come just as increased conflict, displacement and access restrictions are already sharply driving up food aid needs,” it added.
The statement did not mention the United States by name, nor any other donor countries.
But it said that without immediate new funding, “WFP will only be able to assist 35,000 of the most vulnerable people”, including children under five, pregnant and breastfeeding women, and the disabled. Trump’s campaign to dismantle the US’ foreign aid contributions has put the humanitarian community into a tailspin.
“The situation across the country continues to deteriorate,” said the WFP’s Myanmar director Michael Dunford. “It is essential that the international community does not forget the people of Myanmar in their time of need.”
Trump’s scheme to slash federal spending has been unofficially spearheaded by his top donor, the world’s richest man, Elon Musk.
Some of the most concentrated fire has been on Washington’s aid agency USAID – which has a USD42.8 billion budget and is a major contributor to WFP.
But USAID only accounts for between 0.7 and 1.4 per cent of total US government spending over the last 25 years, according to the Pew Research Centre.
