Due to a funding deficiency amid Afghanistan’s severe humanitarian crisis, the UN World Food Programme has been forced to reduce rations for four million Afghans this month, it announced late on Friday.
“In March, at least four million people will receive half of what they need due to funding constraints”. Adding that the UN food agency urgently needs $93 million to reach 13 million people in Afghanistan in April.
Since the Taliban seized power in 2021, the already impoverished nation’s economic crisis has worsened. And foreign governments have cut development funding and imposed banking sanctions.
Some officials, including those from the United Nations, have expressed concern that donors will pull back on the country’s massive humanitarian aid program as a result of a series of restrictions on women imposed by the Taliban administration last year, including a December ban on the employment of the majority of Afghan female non-governmental organization staff.
Reason uncertain
The cause of the World Food Programme’s March shortfall in funding was not readily apparent.
The decrease in rations occurs after a particularly harsh and fatal winter. When many families’ food reserves have been depleted and before the next harvest season in May.
According to the United Nations, approximately 90 percent of Afghans cannot afford enough sustenance.
