KABUL, AFGHANISTAN – The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has warned that one-third of nutrition centres across Afghanistan have closed or suspended services due to funding shortages, as food insecurity and malnutrition continue to worsen in the country.
OCHA said more than four million infants and children under the age of six are expected to require treatment for acute malnutrition next year, raising concerns about the impact of declining humanitarian assistance on vulnerable families.
According to OCHA, 15.9 million people, nearly one-third of Afghanistan’s population, faced crisis-level or worse food insecurity in September and October. Of those, 3.4 million were experiencing emergency levels of food insecurity.
The situation is expected to deteriorate further during the winter lean season, which runs from November to April, as households face growing difficulties accessing sufficient food.
Olga Cherevko, an OCHA spokesperson, said during a virtual press briefing on Tuesday, October 20, that the number of people facing acute food insecurity was projected to rise to 19.2 million, including five million people expected to experience emergency levels of hunger, one phase below famine.
“And we must act before winter, not after families have exhausted all the options. That means getting food assistance to people in need, protecting livestock and productive assets, supporting farmers before critical planting windows clothes, and keeping essential health, nutrition, and water services accessible,” Cherevko said.
According to the latest Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) assessment, more than four million children aged between six months and five years are expected to require treatment for acute malnutrition next year.
Speaking from Kabul during a briefing in Geneva, Cherevko said more than one million of these children were expected to suffer from severe acute malnutrition.
“And these numbers represent children whose parents cannot afford nutritious food and families whose ability to cope has been worn down by years of conflict, economic difficulty, drought, and other shocks,” she said.
Amid the worsening hunger crisis, approximately one-third of nutrition centres across Afghanistan have closed or suspended their services, largely because of funding cuts, according to OCHA.
“And once these services disappear, the consequences could be irreversible, particularly for children,” Cherevko said.
International assistance to Afghanistan has declined sharply. The United Nations reported that by late August, it had received less than 30 per cent of the funding required to deliver life-saving humanitarian assistance.
The humanitarian crisis has been further exacerbated by a series of natural disasters and the forced return of millions of Afghan migrants from Iran and Pakistan since 2023, placing additional pressure on communities already struggling with poverty and limited access to basic services.
Cherevko said humanitarian assistance could save lives but could not indefinitely compensate for the absence of economic opportunities and public services.
She added that Afghanistan’s food crisis was not simply a matter of whether food was available, but also whether people could access it and afford to buy it.
Although improved rainfall and increased agricultural production this year have helped ease some pressures, Cherevko warned that a single good harvest could not make up for the damage caused by years of drought.
