News releases

Rome/Seoul – The head of the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) office in the Republic of Korea has announced that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has contributed US$ 2.4 million to WFP’s food assistance in Ethiopia, Jordan, Türkiye and Afghanistan.

ROME – It is reprehensible that millions of people will be pushed further into hunger by the resumption of fighting in Northern Ethiopia. In the past few months, the humanitarian truce has allowed WFP and our partners to reach almost 5 million people in Tigray. However, yesterday that lifeline was severed.

ADDIS ABABA – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP), the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and the Ethiopian Government Refugees and Returnees Service (RRS) appealed today for US$73m to provide food rations to over 750,000 refugees in Ethiopia, over the next six months. WFP will completely run out of food for refugees by October, leaving vulnerable families who are dependent on food assistance at risk of undernutrition, micronutrient deficiency, susceptibility to diseases/infection and increased protection risks, the three agencies warn.

ADDIS ABABA –  The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) welcomes USD 60 million from the United Arab Emirates to support their humanitarian response in Ethiopia. The funding will provide emergency food and nutrition assistance in response to an alarming rise in food insecurity, particularly in the north of the country where 19 months of war has almost exhausted people’s coping mechanisms and displaced hundreds of thousands from their homes. More than 13 million people require humanitarian food assistance in conflict-affected Afar, Amhara and Tigray regions.
This comes against the backdrop of the global food crisis where rising costs linked to the war in Ukraine are compounding woes. The UAE funds, delivered through the Famine Relief Fund, will allow WFP to continue to address the urgent food needs of 1.6 million people in the conflict-affected north of Ethiopia through food distributions in Tigray, Afar and Amhara. Conditions in Ethiopia have deteriorated due to the combination of conflict, climate shocks and the economic impacts of COVID-19 and the recent crisis in Ukraine. Inflation is at its highest peak in ten years - and the population in need of food assistance has doubled over the past 12 months – to around 20.4 million people.

ADDIS ABABA –  Hunger is tightening its grip on more than 20[1] million people in Ethiopia who are facing a combination of conflict in the north and climate shocks – drought – in the south while dwindling resources mean food and nutrition support may run dry from next month, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) warned today.

ROME – Further food ration cuts are imminent for refugees as humanitarian needs multiply around the world while funding struggles to keep pace, warns the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) on World Refugee Day. The somber warning comes as WFP has already been forced to significantly reduce rations to refugees across its operations.

Nairobi – The Horn of Africa is experiencing the driest conditions recorded since 1981, with severe drought leaving an estimated 13 million people across Ethiopia, Kenya, and Somalia facing severe hunger in the first quarter of this year, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) warned today.

NAIROBI – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) welcomes a contribution of DKK 28.4 million (USD 4.3 million) from the Government of Denmark for Scaling Up Anticipatory Action for Food Security to reduce the effects of climate shocks in the Horn of Africa. This is in addition to the DKK 15 million (USD 2.2 million) given by the Government of Denmark in 2019, to establish systems for financing that is allocated in advance of a climate disaster. This financing enables implementation of pre-agreed anticipatory actions, to reduce the impacts of predictable climate hazards before they materialize.

ADDIS ABABA –  A new food security assessment, released today by the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP), shows that almost 40 percent of Tigrayans are suffering an extreme lack of food, after 15 months of conflict. Meanwhile, across all three conflict-affected regions of the north more than 9 million people are in need of humanitarian food assistance, the highest number yet.

ADDIS ABABA – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) today warned that its life-saving food assistance operations in northern Ethiopia are about to grind to a halt because intense fighting has blocked the passage of fuel and food.

ADDIS ABABA –  The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) is facing a major funding shortfall over the next six months threatening its ability to meet the critical food and nutrition needs of millions of food insecure Ethiopians and refugees.

ADDIS ABABA – The number of people in need of humanitarian food assistance across northern Ethiopia has grown to an estimated 9.4 million as a direct result of ongoing conflict, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) announced today.

This is a summary of what was said by WFP Spokesperson Tomson Phiri – to whom quoted text may be attributed – at today's press briefing at the Palais des Nations in Geneva, Switzerland.


Geneva – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) calls on all parties to the conflict in northern Ethiopia to respect humanitarian operations and assets and allow unimpeded passage of humanitarian relief to civilians in need.

CAIRO – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) welcomes a donation package totalling €7.5 million (approximately US$8.1 million) from the Government of Belgium to support the food agency’s response to rising food needs in Ethiopia, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, and Syria.

ADDIS ABABA – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP), the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), and ARRA, the national agency for Refugee and Returnee Affairs, appealed today for US$68 million to avoid food ration cuts for over 700,000 refugees in Ethiopia.

Rome/London – The World Food Programme (WFP) welcomes a contribution of US$ 2.75 million from Khalsa Aid International as part of a three-year programme to support school children in Yemen and refugees from the Tigray Crisis

ADDIS ABABA – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has completed its first round of food distributions to people impacted by the spread of conflict into Afar and Amhara regions. However, a lack of supplies due to various impediments to the movement of humanitarian aid still sees distributions in Tigray lagging behind.

ADDIS ABABA –  As conflict spills across Northern Ethiopia, forcing 300,000 people from their homes and 1.7 million into hunger in Afar and Amhara provinces, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has announced an unprecedented funding gap of $US426 million across its operation in Ethiopia and appealed for funds to meet the needs of up to 12 million people this year.

ADDIS ABABA – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) delivered food to over a million people in the north-west and parts of southern Tigray in June and July under the second round of distributions, despite numerous challenges. But severe shortages of food, cash, fuel and functioning telecommunications equipment mean WFP has only reached half of those it planned to reach, including communities on the verge of famine.

ROME – A United Nations Humanitarian Air Service (UNHAS) flight managed by WFP and operated by our longstanding aviation services partner – Abyssinia Flight Services - was forced to make a crash landing on the afternoon of Tuesday July 27, whilst transporting passengers between Jigjiga and Dire Dawa.

ADDIS ABABA – The first United Nations Humanitarian Air Service (UNHAS) passenger flight, which is managed by the United Nations World Food Programme, has touched down at Tigray’s Alula Aba Nega International Airport in Mekelle today.

ADDIS ABABA – A United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) convoy of 50 trucks arrived in the Tigrayan capital of Mekelle today with 900 metric tons of food as well as other emergency supplies. However, double this number of trucks needs to be moving in every day to meet the vast humanitarian needs in the region.

ADDIS ABABA – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has resumed its operations in the Tigray region of Ethiopia after fighting halted the emergency response last week. However serious challenges are threatening the entire humanitarian response in the region.

ROME – Alarming new data has today confirmed the magnitude of the hunger emergency gripping Tigray, where at least 4 million people face severe hunger and 350 000 of them are facing famine. The lack of information on people’s food security in western Tigray in the IPC analysis is also deeply worrying.

10 June 2021, Rome - The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and UNICEF call for urgent action to address the dramatic acute food insecurity in northern Ethiopia. The three agencies are particularly concerned about the situation in Tigray region where the risk of famine is imminent, unless food, livelihood assistance and other life-saving interventions continue to be scaled-up, unimpeded access is guaranteed, and hostilities cease.