Trump's USAID cuts lead to food wastage for 3.5 million
What's the story
The abrupt cessation of United States Agency for International Development (USAID) funding has left $98 million worth of food aid, enough to feed 3.5 million people for a month, unused and at risk of expiration in warehouses across Houston, Djibouti, Durban, and Dubai.
The supplies include high-energy biscuits and fortified grains meant for crisis-hit regions like Gaza, Sudan, and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Aid disruption
USAID's dismantling and its impact
The crisis is a result of the dismantling of USAID under the Trump administration, which saw over 90% of foreign aid contracts terminated and $60 billion in global assistance cut.
Jeremy Lewin, a 28-year-old appointee from Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency, now heads the Office of Foreign Assistance, where proposals to release the stranded food await approval.
Aid impact
Human cost of USAID funding cuts
The human toll of these cuts is devastating.
In northeastern Nigeria, Bulama lost her underweight twins to hunger after a Mercy Corps program providing Plumpy'Nut—a therapeutic peanut paste—was halted due to USAID funding cessation in February. One of her twins died two weeks later.
Edesia Nutrition founder Navyn Salem has $13 million worth of Plumpy'Nut sitting idle in a Rhode Island warehouse, hoping for a resolution to deliver aid.
Project suspension
Aid organizations halt projects, child deaths reported
Organizations like Action Against Hunger have been forced to suspend over 50 projects in 20 countries.
Reports of child deaths in the Democratic Republic of the Congo due to suspended operations have emerged.
While some aid programs have resumed after internal and congressional pressure, many remain unresolved.
The World Food Programme warns that cutting emergency food assistance in 14 countries could be a "death sentence" for millions facing extreme hunger.