The Albany Gazette - WFP says funding shortfall forces it to cut food aid to 1 mn people in Myanmar

The United States provided the UN's World Food Programme (WFP) with $4.4 billion of its $9.7 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 United Nations describes as a "polycrisis" of mutually compounding conflict, poverty and instability.

It is controlled by a shifting patchwork of junta forces, ethnic armed groups and pro-democracy partisans that have fractured the economy, driven up poverty and complicated the supply of aid.

The WFP says more than 15 million people in the country of 51 million are unable to meet their daily food needs, with more than two million of them "facing emergency levels of hunger".

"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," it said in a statement.

"These cuts come just as increased conflict, displacement and access restrictions are already sharply driving up food aid needs," it said.

The statement did not mention the United States by name or 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.

The UN warned last year that Rakhine state in Myanmar's west faces an "imminent threat of acute famine".

The WFP said upcoming cuts would hit 100,000 internally displaced people in Rakhine who will "have no access to food" without its assistance.

- 'Lean season' -

Trump's campaign to dismantle US foreign aid contributions has put the humanitarian community into a tailspin.

"The situation across the country continues to deteriorate," said Michael Dunford, the WFP's Myanmar director.

"It is essential that the international community does not forget the people of Myanmar in their time of need."

The cuts will come just ahead of Myanmar's "lean season" between the planting and harvesting of rice, maize and vegetables, which lasts from July to September.

The WFP says it "urgently needs $60 million to maintain its life-saving food assistance to the people of Myanmar this year".

Trump's scheme to slash federal spending has been spearheaded by Elon Musk, his top donor and the world's richest person.

Trump has claimed the US Agency for International Development (USAID) is "run by radical lunatics", while Musk has described it as a "criminal organisation" that needs to be put "through the woodchipper".

USAID has a $42.8 billion budget, with health and emergency programs in around 120 countries, and is a major contributor to the WFP.

(N.Miller--TAG)