WFP competes to provide food aid to millions of people on the brink
The horrific war between hunger and Sudan pushed Mussa of Abdelminim from his hometown. Sudanese father sat in the sand of the Kurshig refugee camp in eastern Chad and explains how his family escaped the perpetrators who crossed the border and surrounded the village of North Darfur.
“We had nothing,” says Musa, who arrived at this desolate camp earlier this year, with white tents, thorn trees and not much else being scattered. “I try my best to support my children.”
For now, the survival of his family relies almost entirely on the distribution of the World Food Program (WFP) of vegetable oils, salts, sorghum and split peas. But as refugees continue to pour and funding continues to shrink, their valuable food risks total depletion. And there are few other options to stay alive.
Despair and hunger are rising across West and Central Africa, driven by a severe convergence of rising prices, extreme weather events, conflict and a sharp decline in humanitarian assistance.
Experts find that nearly 53 million people face severe food insecurity during the lean season of June to August. Almost 3 million people risk emergency or catastrophic hunger, at the highest level of hunger. Even if the needs skyrocket, the lack of funds has forced WFP to cut food aid to millions of people during the toughest months of the year.
“Things are very bad. For example, Niger and Mali have seen more than 45% cash cuts compared to last year,” says Margot van der Belden, WFP regional director in West Africa. “This is a trend that continues to deteriorate in terms of food security and malnutrition. I’m also worried about the outlook for the 2025 flood.”
Today, WFP needs US$710 million to reach 5.6 million most vulnerable people over the next six months, including malnourished children and pregnant and nursing mothers. This is less than half of the nearly 12 million people originally planned to support it.
“We’ve now become a group of people who have been prioritized in emergencies,” says van der Werden. “If we are forced to cut down on their aid, they probably have no choice but to migrate, starve, or take up arms.”
Evacuated the most at-risk people
Conflicts, population migration, economic crises, and more frequent, severe flooding count among the top hunger drivers in the region. The fallout is extensive. It is a competition between communities that deepen malnutrition, raise tensions, and transcend rare resources. Refugees and those displaced internally have been hit hardest.
That’s the case with Chad, with over 3.7 million people expected to face serious hunger in the coming months. Many include hosts of 1.4 million refugees – the majority of them resolve the conflict in Sudan.
“My only wish for the future is not to get hungry,” says 25-year-old Makka Ahmat Haroun. Like Mussa, she is from North Darfur, Sudan, and arrived only at Kurshig Camp earlier this year.
“These people leave almost everything behind,” WFP’s van der Werden said of millions of people throughout the region. “They don’t have a livelihood, often have no access to land or basic services. They often rely entirely on what the community and host government can offer.”
In neighboring Cameroon, anxiety is also driving hunger, rising prices. In the Northwest region, retired civil servant Saahkem Manfred and his extended family are uprooted by violence.
“We are extremely grateful for the support that the global food program has given us,” says the dad of seven who have a small garden that raises pigs, chickens and helps them get past their families.
In addition to the urgent increase in humanitarian funding, breaking the cycle of emergency needs is equally important, with important success stories in the region.
If long-term funding exists, WFP is working with governments and partners to build more sustainable futures. In Mauritania, WFP supports farmers like Khada Ahmed Val, stabilize durability, plant resistant crops, establish stone barriers to wind-blown sand, and restore degraded soil through techniques like semi-ono that captures very important rainwater.
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“Before you see the crop buried in the wind and sand,” Val says. Now she says, “We were able to boost the harvest and raise livestock.”
“Things are beginning to change,” says Boubou BA, who is working on WFP Mauritania’s resilience program.
In Niger’s West Tirabury region, WFP is working with authorities on multifaceted efforts to enhance the resilience and food security of local farmers and displaced populations through a number of programs, from building boreholes and irrigation ponds to establishing market gardens to supporting school lunches for young students.
Findings show that these WFP-backed resilience projects across five Sahel countries have restored hundreds of thousands of hectares of degraded land and changed the lives of millions of people.
“If we can get the funds to work with our communities, we can transform ecosystems and increase social cohesion and livelihoods,” says WFP’s van der Belden. “And it greatly reduces the need for humanitarian assistance.”
