Afghanistan faces unprecedented child hunger as aid cuts bite

Afghanistan is facing an unprecedented hunger crisis that is pushing millions of children toward severe malnutrition, according to aid agencies and recent reporting from western Herat and the Badakhshan region. The World Food Programme (WFP) says more than three million children are in peril as international funding has dwindled and aid flows have shuddered to a near halt following policy shifts and sanctions. In Herat’s Sheidaee settlement, families recount the loss of three boys to malnutrition, underscoring the human toll of the crisis. Ghulam Mohiddin and his wife Nazo showed BBC reporters the graves of their sons Rahmat, aged one, Koatan, seven months, and Faisal Ahmad, three months, all of whom died in the past two years. "Can you imagine how painful it's been for me to lose three children? One minute there’s a baby in your arms, the next minute they are empty," Nazo said. "I hope every day that angels would somehow put my babies back in our home."

The graveside account reflects a broader emergency. The UN says Afghanistan is in the grip of a hunger crisis that has widened sharply since the start of the year. John Aylieff, the WFP’s country director, said the organization started the year with the highest increase in child malnutrition ever recorded in Afghanistan, and things have since worsened. He noted that food assistance had effectively kept a lid on hunger for the bottom five million people who rely on international aid; that lid has now been lifted, threatening even more lives. The donor landscape has shifted dramatically, with the United States sharply reducing nearly all aid to Afghanistan earlier this year and eight or nine other major donors following suit, not only because of Afghanistan but due to competing global crises.

Hunger is compounded by drought and economic disruption. The Taliban government says its leadership has expanded assistance and blames sanctions and a budget constrained by lower internal revenue for shortfalls. Suhail Shaheen, the Taliban’s head of the political office in Doha, told BBC that aid is being delivered where possible, but that sanctions and a budget shortfall complicate relief efforts. He said, "Those who are facing malnutrition, those who are facing hunger, it's because of sanctions, because of aid cuts by international organisations. It's not because of the government." He added that the government continues to work within its capacity while facing external constraints. The debate over sanctions and aid has become a central hurdle to lifting Afghanistan out of a humanitarian emergency that many fear will worsen as winter approaches.

The Taliban’s policies toward women and NGOs also complicate relief operations. A BBC analysis notes that the enforcement of a previously announced ban on Afghan women working for NGOs threatens the delivery of life-saving aid, a point highlighted by UN agencies and humanitarian groups. The UN says humanitarian access and livelihoods are at serious risk if women are barred from frontline relief work, given that many aid operations rely on female health workers to reach women and children.

The crisis in Afghanistan is not occurring in isolation. A severe drought has reduced agricultural incomes across more than half of the provinces, and more than two million Afghans have returned from Iran and Pakistan, cutting remittance flows that families depend on for basic needs. Against this backdrop, aid groups say there is insufficient funding to sustain programs as winter looms. John Aylieff warned that WFP funding could run out in November; without a new injection, the agency has begun turning away malnourished women and children from health centers.

Hanifa Sayedi, a mother in a mud-and-clay home outside Herat, embodies the daily struggle. Her one-year-old son, Rafiullah, is malnourished and barely able to sit upright. "I took him to a clinic where they told me he's malnourished, but I don't have the money to keep taking him there," she said. The family, with two other children, survives on dry bread and Afghan green tea. She soaks bread in tea to feed him because he has no teeth yet, and she sometimes gives him sleeping pills to quiet his constant hunger, a dangerous measure that doctors warn can harm young bodies over time. A strip of Lorazepam and another of Propanolol were purchased for a total of about 10 Afghanis, roughly the price of a single loaf of bread in some markets. "I feel so guilty that my children are going hungry and I can't do much. I feel suffocated and like I should kill my children and myself," Hanifa said. Medical professionals warn that such medications can damage a child’s heart, kidneys and liver when used inappropriately.

WFP has noted a rising toll on families like Hanifa’s. The agency says it has retrained hotline staff to respond to more calls from desperate women seeking help for their children, including calls of suicide where hunger and lack of options overwhelm families. The crisis is also playing out in hospitals. In Badakhshan’s regional hospital, the malnutrition ward once housed 26 children across 12 beds, among them Sana, a three-month-old with malnutrition, acute diarrhea and a cleft lip; her mother Zamira said she feared losing another child after her first daughter died in the first weeks of life. Sana’s hands and feet grew blue as she received oxygen; nearby, Musleha, five months old, battled malnutrition and measles. Twins Mutehara and Maziyan were also critically ill with malnutrition and measles. A week after the BBC team visited, Zamira said Sana, Musleha and Mutehara had died. Zamira’s grief underscored the abrupt, deadly turn malnutrition can take in a System with constrained resources.

We simply cannot afford to feed them, and the tragedy outside Badakhshan mirrors the broader national trajectory. Aylieff underscored that without renewed funding in the next few months, child mortality linked to malnutrition could rise further in the months ahead. The humanitarian community warns that the worst is not over if donors do not step forward to replenish life-saving nutrition programs.

As winter approaches, aid agencies caution that households that survived on handouts and informal work are at the brink of collapse. The scale of the tragedy in Afghanistan—illustrated by the deaths of Rahmat, Koatan, Faisal Ahmad and the many other children—has prompted renewed calls for immediate, sustained international support to prevent further child deaths and to keep health services from failing under the weight of hunger. The BBC’s reporting from Herat and Badakhshan highlights how hunger has moved from a distant statistic to a harrowing, day-to-day reality for families across the country.