The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs launched a $29 billion “survival appeal” on Monday to meet urgent global needs amid brutal cuts in humanitarian aid.

UN relief chief Tom Fletcher expressed deep concerns that the agency was facing the most severe funding shortfall in the history of humanitarian aid.

Mr Fletcher said the appeal covers 180 million vulnerable people across 70 countries.

“We have been forced into a triage of human survival,” Mr Fletcher said, adding that the math is cruel, and the consequences are heartbreaking. “Too many people will not get the support they need, but we will save as many lives as we can with the resources we are given.”

He said the “hyper-prioritised” appeal aimed to re-prioritise individual country plans in pursuit of two main goals.

The first, to reach people and places facing the most urgent humanitarian needs, and second, to prioritise life-saving support based on existing planning for the 2025 humanitarian response.

This is intended to ensure that limited resources are directed where they can do the most good as quickly as possible.

OCHA said rather than limiting life-saving aid to a predetermined matrix, humanitarian partners are focused on addressing the most urgent needs in ways that respect the dignity of affected people.

This, the agency stressed, would allow the affected people to choose what they need most.

“Brutal funding cuts leave us with brutal choices,” Mr Fletcher said adding, “All we ask is one per cent of what you chose to spend last year on war. But this isn’t just an appeal for money, it’s a call for global responsibility, for human solidarity, for a commitment to end the suffering.”

OCHA launched the Global Humanitarian Overview on December 4, 2024, in Geneva, Switzerland, in partnership with Kuwait and Nairobi, in partnership with the African Union.

The GHO called for $44 billion, but OCHA expressed concerns that at the halfway point of the year, less than 13 per cent of that amount had been received. 

(NAN)