A lifeline at risk: food assistance at a breaking point - Afghanistan country report

Key messages:

Afghanistan’s food security and nutrition crisis is deepening fast, and humanitarian funding cuts are an important driver. The international community can still prevent catastrophic outcomes if political, financial and operational choices are made urgently.

Afghanistan has deep, structural vulnerabilities that are being amplified by funding cuts

Even before the current funding crisis, Afghanistan ranked among the world’s lowest in human development and most climate-vulnerable countries. Decades of conflict, a fragile economy heavily dependent on external aid, recurrent droughts, and weak basic services left the country highly exposed. With minimal fiscal space and a widening trade deficit, it faces social service collapse with severe consequences for its population.

Cuts in assistance are eroding diets and driving a faster-thananticipated rise in severe food insecurity

The number of people in need of urgent food and livelihood assistance (IPC Phase 3 or above) was projected to decrease from 12.6 million in March to April 2025 to 9.5 million in May to October 2025, based in part on high agricultural production forecasts. However, persistent drought conditions this year in 19 of 34 provinces have severely reduced agricultural output. WFP data and on-the-ground monitoring indicate that the exclusion of households will result in at least a 26 percent increase in poor food consumption,1 while communities consistently report children surviving on bread and tea.

Without urgent funding, Afghanistan risks an alarming surge in child wasting and preventable mortality

The closure of 298 nutrition sites in the first half of 2025 has significantly reduced programme coverage, with a 54 percent decline in mobile health and nutrition team sites since 2024. In southern Afghanistan, the closure of 38 WFP-supported nutrition sites has left over 141 000 people without treatment, including more than 82 000 young children. In districts with the deepest cuts, admissions for acute malnutrition are 16 percent higher, mainly children under 2 years old.

Households are normalizing extreme coping, including child labour and sale

Cuts have normalized severe and culturally unthinkable coping strategies: child labour, early marriage, sale of children, and sale of body organs. One mother described selling her 9-year-old daughter for AFN 120 000 (about USD 1 700) to pay debts. Others spoke of fathers taking their own lives after failing to find work. These are not isolated tragedies but indicators of a systemic collapse in households’ coping capacity and erosion of social norms under pressure.