Khartoum, Sudan

Tuesday, July 15, 2025

The United Nations fears it will run out of funds to tackle the growing famine and malnutrition affecting millions of Sudanese in a country ravaged by two years of war, the World Food Programme (WFP) said on Monday.

“Food aid is a lifeline for vulnerable refugee families who have nowhere else to turn”, as a “full-blown regional crisis’” affects countries already affected by “extreme levels of food insecurity and high levels of conflict”, WFP regional coordinator Shaun Hughes points out in a statement.

“WFP just needs more than $200 million to maintain its emergency response to Sudanese refugees” in neighboring countries – Egypt, Uganda, Chad, Central African Republic, South Sudan, Ethiopia, Libya – and $575 million for Sudan’s 10 million or so internally displaced people who fled fighting between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, the text continues.

The UN claims that its humanitarian response plan for Sudan, a country hit by “the world’s biggest famine crisis”, is only 14.4% funded, while international aid is facing a funding shortfall of several trillion dollars notably linked to cuts decided by US President Donald Trump.

A UN conference in Spain this week aims to mobilize new support.

The war for power between General Abdel Fattah al-Burhane, head of the army and de facto ruler of the country since the 2021 coup, and his former ally General Mohamed Hamdane Daglo, head of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), has left thousands dead in Sudan since April 2023, destroyed public infrastructure and disrupted agricultural production in this Nile-irrigated country.

In Sudan itself, more than 8 million people are on the brink of famine and almost 25 million – half the population – are suffering from extreme food insecurity, according to the WFP.

Without funding, support for Sudanese refugees in Egypt, Ethiopia, Libya and the Central African Republic “could come to a halt in the coming months as resources run out”, warns the statement.

In Egypt – where 1.5 million refugees have flocked from Sudan since the start of the conflict – food assistance has already been cut for 85,000 people this year, and vital aid will cease by August without additional funding, the WFP warns.

In Chad, where over 850,000 people have fled and a thousand new refugees arrive every day from Darfur (western Sudan), food rations will continue to be cut.

Humaniterre with AFP