Afghanistan Times
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KABUL — Afghanistan is witnessing its sharpest rise in child malnutrition on record, the UN World Food Program (WFP) warned Monday, as a devastating mix of aid shortfalls, climate shocks, and mass deportations pushes the country deeper into humanitarian crisis. The WFP says it urgently needs $539 million through January to support Afghanistan’s most vulnerable families, with nearly 10 million people—roughly a quarter of the population—facing acute food insecurity.
The warning follows a sharp decline in international donor support, which has severely reduced emergency food assistance over the past two years. That decline was compounded in April when the U.S. administration under President Donald Trump cut off food aid to Afghanistan altogether. Washington had previously been the largest single donor to the WFP, providing $4.5 billion of the agency’s $9.8 billion global budget last year.
“This is the worst we have seen,” said WFP spokesperson Ziauddin Safi, noting that one in three Afghan children is now stunted—a sign of chronic malnutrition that can impair cognitive development and physical growth for life.
Previous U.S. administrations had framed food assistance as a tool of soft power—helping to reduce conflict, prevent extremism, and manage migration by alleviating poverty in fragile regions. The Trump administration’s reversal, in a bid to reduce overseas aid spending, has left humanitarian agencies scrambling.
Afghanistan’s crisis is further aggravated by ongoing mass returns from neighboring countries. Pakistan and Iran have intensified deportations of undocumented foreigners in recent months, sending tens of thousands of Afghans back to a country already struggling to feed its people. The WFP says it supported 60,000 returnees from Iran over the last two months—just a fraction of those crossing the border.
“Going forward, the WFP does not have sufficient funding to cover the returnee response and requires $15 million to assist all eligible returnees from Iran,” Safi added.
At the same time, climate change is inflicting fresh pain on the country’s rural communities. Prolonged droughts, dwindling water supplies, shrinking farmland, and sudden flash floods are all taking a “profound toll” on people’s lives and the economy, said Matiullah Khalis, head of Afghanistan’s National Environmental Protection Agency.
The worsening hunger crisis comes amid deepening isolation of the Taliban government, which remains unrecognized internationally, leaving Afghan civilians caught between geopolitics and climate-driven disaster.
Humanitarian experts warn that unless funding is restored soon, Afghanistan’s most vulnerable—especially children—could suffer irreversible harm.
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