Without additional funding, five million people in Yemen may soon see cuts in food assistance by the end of the year, rising to 7.5 million people in early 2022, the World Food Program warned.
The UN agency said donors are urged to disburse pledges and provide additional funding to enable partners to sustain the current level of response until the end of the year.
It said that while donors have pledged additional resources towards the humanitarian response to Yemen last September, only 55 percent of the $3.85 billion required for 2021 has been provided by the end of last month.
In a weekly briefing of the humanitarian situation in Yemen, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) said key humanitarian response sectors in Yemen, including health, WASH, shelter, camp management and protection, are struggling to meet needs.
“All of these sectors have received less than 20 percent of needed funds. By August, over 3.4 million people were reached with WASH services, health cluster partners assisted 528,235 people, while 771,307 people received nutrition treatment,” it said.
UNOCHA said that aid agencies in Yemen continue to scale up response efforts despite limited financial resources, the COVID-19 pandemic, a challenging operating environment and a deteriorating humanitarian situation due to escalating hostilities and a perpetually declining economy.
“With $2.1 billion received by the end of October, aid agencies have been able to resume full food rations to some of the most food insecure Yemenis in 2021 as donors stepped up with $1.2 billion for food assistance,” the UN agency said.
It added that Yemen remains at high risk of descending into a deeper crisis with some 20.7 million people in need of assistance and protection.
“As the armed conflict continues to escalate alongside the waning economy, vulnerable populations are increasingly unable to cope,” UNOCHA said, adding that aid agencies are conducting country-wide humanitarian needs assessments to enable the understanding of the most pressing humanitarian needs across sectors in Yemen.
