Funding Gap Forces UN to Ration Food Aid in South Sudan

(JUBA) – South Sudan is sliding towards its worst hunger crisis since independence as a severe lack of funding forces United Nations agencies to cut food aid, leaving millions of people without enough support to survive.

The World Food Programme and the Food and Agriculture Organisation issued a joint warning on Friday. They said a combination of growing local conflict, climate shocks, and a critically underfunded aid budget has pushed the country to a tipping point.

Funding shortages have forced the agencies to ration assistance. They now focus almost entirely on people already facing what is classified as Integrated Food Security Phase Classification Phase 5, known as Catastrophe levels of hunger.

The agencies warned that this narrow focus leaves millions of other people in highly vulnerable and unstable conditions without the help they need.

The latest figures from the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification for April to July show that 7.8 million people, or 55 percent of the population, are in Phase 3 Crisis or worse. This is an increase of about 280,000 people compared to the projection for the September 2025 lean season.

The agencies said high risk areas face a catastrophic coming together of threats. They named Akobo, Nyirol, Luakpiny/Nasir and Ulang among the hardest hit locations.

In these areas, a devastating mix of rising local conflict, mass displacement, severe limits on humanitarian access, and total collapse of local markets has pushed communities to the brink.

The funding gap affecting South Sudan is part of a wider pattern of reduced support from the United States and other traditional donors.

Aid agencies have had to make deep cuts to food distributions, nutrition programmes, and livelihood support across the country. The agencies did not state the exact size of the funding shortfall in their latest warning.

Humanitarian workers say the situation is expected to worsen as the lean season continues. The lean season is the period between harvests when food stocks run low.

Without an urgent injection of new funds, millions of South Sudanese face the prospect of severe acute malnutrition and hunger related deaths in the months ahead.

The warning from the two UN agencies comes as South Sudan also grapples with the effects of conflict in neighbouring Sudan, which has sent tens of thousands of refugees across the border, adding further pressure on already stretched humanitarian resources.