By Nkechi Eze
The United Nations World Food Programme has issued a stark warning over imminent cuts to emergency food and nutrition assistance in Nigeria, as escalating violence, displacement and deepening hunger push millions closer to catastrophe, particularly across the country’s northern regions.
In an official signed statement, the World Food Programme disclosed that more than one million people in northeast Nigeria could be cut off from life-saving food assistance within weeks unless urgent new funding is secured. As a result of the severe funding shortfall, WFP revealed that, for the first time in its operations in Nigeria, food assistance will be reduced to only 72,000 people, leaving vast numbers of vulnerable households without support.
Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, is currently facing one of its worst hunger crises in recent history. According to the most recent Cadre Harmonisé analysis, the regional equivalent of the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification nearly 35 million people are projected to experience acute and severe food insecurity during the 2026 lean season. Of this number, an estimated 15,000 people in Borno State alone are already at risk of catastrophic hunger, classified as IPC Phase 5, just one step away from famine. The situation represents the worst levels of hunger recorded in Nigeria in more than a decade.
Reacting to the grim outlook, WFP’s Nigeria Country Director, David Stevenson, warned that halting food assistance at this critical moment would have devastating consequences. He stressed that withdrawing humanitarian support would deepen suffering and trigger wider humanitarian, security and economic repercussions.
“Now is not the time to stop food assistance,” Stevenson said. “This will lead to catastrophic humanitarian, security and economic consequences for the most vulnerable people who have been forced to flee their homes in search of food and shelter. Humanitarian solutions are still possible and are one of the last stabilizing forces preventing mass displacement and regional spillover.”
Since 2015, the World Food Programme has been at the forefront of emergency food assistance in northeast Nigeria, reaching nearly two million women, men and children in some of the country’s most conflict-affected and hard-to-reach communities every year. Beyond immediate relief, WFP’s operations combine emergency assistance with resilience-building interventions designed to help communities withstand food shocks and gradually reduce long-term dependency on aid.
The organisation’s approach also prioritises home-grown solutions that support the local economy, including procuring food assistance domestically to strengthen agricultural value chains and promote self-sufficiency among vulnerable populations.
However, renewed violence across northern Nigeria has severely undermined these gains. Fragile rural communities have been devastated by persistent attacks, leading to mass displacement, the destruction of food reserves and livelihoods, and rapidly worsening food insecurity. In the past four months alone, an estimated 3.5 million people have been forced to flee their homes, with about 80 per cent of the displaced population located in northern states.
The impact on children and other vulnerable groups has been particularly severe, as malnutrition rates across several northern states have deteriorated sharply, reaching what humanitarian agencies classify as ‘critical’ levels.
WFP noted that while generous donor contributions in recent months helped sustain life-saving assistance to the most vulnerable, those resources have now been fully exhausted, leaving the organisation with limited capacity to respond to rapidly growing needs.
As violence, displacement and hunger continue to intersect, the World Food Programme warned that without immediate international support, Nigeria risks sliding further into a humanitarian emergency with far-reaching implications for national stability and regional security.
