After years of war, Ethiopia's Tigray region now faces long wait for limited food aid

A brutal civil conflict in northern Ethiopia's Tigray region ended in late 2022, leaving tens of thousands of people dead, but sporadic violence has continued in several parts of the country since. Besides the immediate, deadly consequences in communities devastated by years of violence, limited food supplies and restrictions on aid support during the conflict affected not only Tigray, but neighboring regions like Afar as well. A reliance on foreign aid - much of it financed by the United States through UN agencies like the World Food Program - has been a feature of life for decades in much of Ethiopia, where changing Climatic conditions and conflict have made access to food difficult. But government instability in Tigray also led to widespread corruption and the diversion of foreign food aid, forcing the U.S. government to suspend funding for six months in 2023. The effects were severe in Tigray, Afar and elsewhere in Ethiopia; and at times,were deadly. The current curtailment of U.S. aid has already forced the World Food Program to close its office in South Africa, and threatens many more lives in nations like Ethiopia, where the margins between starvation and survival are already incredibly narrow.

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