UN drastically cuts humanitarian aid plan due to lack of funds

The UN announced on Monday a drastic revision of its global humanitarian aid plan for this year, due to "the worst financial cuts ever to hit the humanitarian sector," according to a statement.

The new $29 billion plan, compared to $44 billion previously requested by the UN for 2025, is expected to "hyperprioritize" aid for 114 million people, according to a statement released by the UN's humanitarian aid coordination agency (OCHA). The initial plan was intended to help "180 million vulnerable people."

A financial abyss with disastrous consequences

According to OCHA, the UN has only managed to raise $5.6 billion of the $44 billion initially requested, or 13% of the total, even though we are already halfway through the year and humanitarian crises have multiplied: Sudan, Gaza, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Burma, and Ukraine in particular.

The entire global humanitarian sector has been thrown into turmoil by US President Donald Trump's decision to end or scale back US foreign aid. Washington had previously been the largest donor of all forms of development assistance, and the drastic funding cuts have had dramatic consequences for emergency aid, vaccinations, and the distribution of drugs to combat AIDS.

American funds sometimes represented a significant portion of the budgets of UN agencies or various NGOs, and these losses are impossible to compensate for in a few weeks or even months. WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, among many others, denounced a decision that could cost millions of lives.

Africa particularly affected by the drop in aid

In early May, the World Food Programme sounded the alarm about worsening hunger in West and Central Africa. At the end of March, the UN agency described an "unprecedented crisis" due to a 40% cut in its funding for 2025.

In Bangladesh, the fight against tuberculosis and its eradication have been called into question. In Colombia's largest camp for migrants and indigenous peoples, in the Guajira desert (northeast), only three out of 28 NGOs were still able to provide assistance as of May.

But the United States is not alone in this, as many donor countries have scaled back their aid to focus on other priorities in sometimes difficult economic contexts.

Heartbreaking choices for humanitarian aid

"We have been forced to make a triage of human survival," denounced Tom Fletcher, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator. "The reckoning is stark, and the consequences are heartbreaking. Too many people will not receive the help they need, but we will save as many lives as possible with the resources given to us," he promised.

To do as much as possible with much less, the UN wants to focus on two key objectives: reaching the people and places facing the most urgent needs and building on existing aid plans to direct limited resources where they can be most helpful—as quickly as possible.

The UN will use a scale that ranks the severity of humanitarian needs. Areas classified as level 4 or 5—"indicating extreme or catastrophic conditions"—will be given priority. To increase flexibility and speed, assistance will be provided in cash where possible, to "allow people to choose what they need most." "Sudden budget cuts leave us with brutal choices," Fletcher acknowledges.