The US decision to suspend foreign aid has exacerbated Sudan’s catastrophic hunger crisis.
Since taking office in January, US President Donald Trump’s administration has taken or fired the majority of employees of the US Organization for International Development (USAID) on leave and suspended almost all global projects in IT funding.
Last year, USAID contributed 44% to Sudan’s $1.8 billion humanitarian response, according to the United Nations.
A portion of this total has come to support the Emergency Response Room (ERRS), a nearby relief group that supports hundreds of “community kitchens” across the country.
“Around 80% of Sudan’s 1,460 community kitchens have been closed [when USAID paused all funding]Hajoj Kuka, spokesman for Ellers in Khartoum state, said.
Filling the gap
As a power struggle between the Sudanese Army (SAF) and Paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) erupted into the Civil War in April 2023, the joint kitchen continues to live hundreds of thousands of people in areas that UN agencies and global relief organizations cannot reach due to intermittent obstruction of aid by war parties.
Despite efforts by ERR volunteers, more than 600,000 people in Sudan are dealing with hunger hunger, and about 8 million people continue to fall into hunger, according to Global Hunger Monitor, the United Nations Integrated Food Security Stage Classification (IPC).
A suspension of USAID funding risks exacerbating the hunger crisis.
According to Iyad Agha, the humanitarian coordinator of Sudan’s international non-governmental organizations, some organizations have obtained exemptions from the US government to continue managing life-saving services.
However, many of these services ended after they decided that subsequent reviews by the US were not necessary to sustain life. A few days later, the Trump administration overturned some endings and allowed some services to resume.
Aga said Washington’s decision appears to be “completely random.”
“NGOs are paralyzed and don’t know how they will go in the confusion, confusion and impacted people [who need aid in Sudan] He told Al Jazeera.
“The problem is when other donors want to intervene. [for the absence of USAID] There is [a large gap] To achieve this,” Aga added.
The ERR took the problem to his own hands and found alternative funds.
Kuka said the Community Kitchen has solicited funds from Sudan’s diaspora and small charities to continue to serve food to civilians troubled by the holy month of Ramadan, which began in early March.
Their efforts have helped hundreds of community kitchens reopen nationwide, but 63% have remained closed since the US government suspends most foreign aid, Kuka said.
“There’s a lot we can do. People don’t have enough food,” he told Al Jazeera.
“But we have started online drives for people to donate. During Ramadan, people tend to donate more during this time,” he added.
Disability and stolen
According to local and foreign relief workers, both Sudan’s civil war is responsible for creating a hunger crisis.
One issue cited by some relief workers is that UN agencies effectively recognize Sudanese troops as government.
The policy gave the Army the authority to approve or deny the delivery of aid across borders from neighboring countries such as Chad and South Sudan, which are not controlled by the Army. Critics previously told Al Jazeera that humanitarians should work with relevant authorities in each region of Sudan to reach as many poor people as possible.
Furthermore, UN agencies that treat the Army virtually as government are required to exclude all humanitarian operations from Port Sudan, making it logistically difficult to reach far-reaching areas, such as Mount Nuba in Southern Kordofan and the vast areas of Darfur.
The Army is also accused of imposing bureaucratic obstacles to obstruct and delay the delivery of aid.
“The Army’s procedures are extremely tedious. It’s a pile of documents,” explained Leni Kinsli, a spokesman for the World Food Programme (WFP).
“We must deal with a variety of authorities, including the Military Intelligence, the Humanitarian Aid Committee, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, General Information Services, and National Information Services.
“Essentially [aid truck to move]you need to get stamps from all these institutions,” she told Al Jazeera.
Analysts and relief workers denounce the SAF for banning assistance to communities under RSF management. However, Army spokesman Nabil Abdullah repeatedly denied the charges and criticised the RSF for hungry civilians.
Hind al-Atif, a spokesman for Err for Sharq El-Nile, a vast neighbour of Khartoum, accused the RSF of exacerbating the hunger crisis.
She said the group has plundered all the major markets in Khartoum ahead of Ramadan and are hesitant to leave the neighborhood to find food out of fear that many civilians could be attacked at RSF checkpoints.
“The RSF often steals people’s money and phones, so people are scared to run away,” she told Al Jazeera.
Al Jazeera contacted the RSF press conference room regarding allegations that the fighters were robbing civilians at the muzzle and plunder market, but the group did not respond before publication.
Anxiety and hunger
As fighting escalates between the RSF and Sudanese troops, local relief groups and aid agencies find it increasingly difficult to reach the troubled civilians.
At the Zamzam Displacement Camp, where over half a million people have evacuated to North Darfur and struggle to survive the hunger, the WFP was forced to suspend aid operations when the RSF fired the camp on February 10th and 11th.
WFP provided food vouchers to approximately 60,000 people in Zamzam through a local organization.
“Their ground partners were forced to evacuate. They were forced to run for their own lives. [due to RSF shelling] And that’s why we had to suspend support,” said Kinzli, an agency spokesman.
The battle of Khartoum is causing a major displacement throughout the Sharq El-Nile, and is about to try new arrivals of thousands of people in the remaining few communal kitchens.
As people become more desperate, Kuka says that many people are trying to find fish on the Nile and grow vegetables in their gardens, but the amount most people eat is hardly enough.
He noted that errors are reaching out to the European Union and UN agencies to try to fill the gap left by USAID. If no one intervened, Kuka warned that hundreds of thousands of people would starve and die from malnutrition-related illnesses.
“We talk about about 1.8 million people who are profiting from these kitchens. What does it mean that they can no longer get food?” asked Kuka.
“People are already dominant. We [as ERRs] We are doing our best to stop more parts of Sudan from falling into complete hunger. But in this case [food shortage] Continuing on, there have been more and more hunger pockets throughout the country. ”
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