Van Hollen, Durbin, Bipartisan Colleagues Urge President Biden to Include Funding for Emergency International Food Aid in Any Supplemental Request to Congress

U.S. Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) joined Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) in a bipartisan letter to President Biden urging him to include funding for emergency international food aid in any upcoming supplemental request to Congress. Recently, the Biden Administration provided an additional $308 million in aid and eased procedures for humanitarian groups.  However, the Senators noted in their letter that both the United Nations and World Food Programme (WFP) indicate far more is needed to prevent mass starvation in multiple countries, particularly in Afghanistan where nearly half the population is at severe risk.

“Despite progress in recent decades to prevent and alleviate global hunger, 2020 and 2021 have seen the highest levels of hunger in more than ten years with the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbating conflict areas and severe droughts,” the Senators wrote.  “Nowhere are the humanitarian needs more acute than in Afghanistan, where freezing winter weather is only worsening acute hunger… As such, we urge you to include robust funding for emergency international food aid as part of any upcoming supplemental request to Congress.  These additional funds… would go a long way toward preventing starvation around the world.”  

According to the United Nations’ 2021 report, The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World, close to 12 percent of the world’s population, representing 928 million people, faces severe food insecurity and 30 percent face at least moderate food insecurity. The impact is particularly significant on women and children, with more than 149 million children under the age of five affected by stunting and nearly 30 percent of women around the world between the ages of 15 and 49 affected by anemia.   

Along with Senators Van Hollen and Durbin, today’s letter was signed by the following Senators: Jerry Moran (R-Kan.), Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), Chris Coons (D-Del.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Bob Casey (D-Pa.), Jack Reed (D-R.I.), Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Ben Cardin (D-Md.), Mark Warner (D-Va.), Ed Markey (D-Mass.), and Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.).  

Full text of today’s letter is available here and below: 

Dear President Biden:

We write to convey our great concern with mounting global food insecurity, particularly in Afghanistan where nearly half the population is at severe risk.  We welcome your recent decisions to provide an additional $308 million in aid and ease procedures for humanitarian groups to help meet these desperate conditions, and hope other international donors will take similar actions.  However, given that both the United Nations and World Food Programme (WFP) indicate far more is needed to prevent mass starvation in multiple countries, we strongly urge you to include funding for emergency international food aid in any upcoming supplemental request to Congress.  

Despite progress in recent decades to prevent and alleviate global hunger, 2020 and 2021 have seen the highest levels of hunger in more than ten years with the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbating conflict areas and severe droughts.  According to the United Nations’ 2021 report, The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World, close to 12 percent of the world’s population, representing 928 million people, faces severe food insecurity and 30 percent face at least moderate food insecurity.   The impact is particularly significant on women and children, with more than 149 million children under the age of five affected by stunting and nearly 30 percent of women around the world between the ages of 15 and 49 affected by anemia.   Such severe and rising levels of food insecurity impact nearly every region of the world.  In fact, the WFP warned in November that 45 million people are on the brink of famine across 43 countries, a devastating figure that is nearly 67 percent higher than the estimated 27 million in a similar dire situation in 2019.   

Nowhere are the humanitarian needs more acute than in Afghanistan, where freezing winter weather is only worsening acute hunger.  According to the WFP and the Food and Agriculture Organization, while Afghanistan has suffered from malnutrition for decades, recent factors put an estimated 23 million people, around 55 percent of Afghanistan’s population, at potentially life-threatening levels of food insecurity.   In addition, the United Nations Development Programme warned that as much as 97 percent of Afghanistan’s population is at risk of sinking below the poverty line by this summer.   

As such, we urge you to include robust funding for emergency international food aid as part of any upcoming supplemental request to Congress.  These additional funds, through the International Disaster Assistance account, Food for Peace Title II, or others as appropriate, would go a long way toward preventing starvation around the world.

We stand ready to help with such a request and appreciate your attention to this timely issue. 

Sincerely,