The global humanitarian aid system is crumbling, according to a new report released Thursday that also revealed a tidy statistic: 64 million fewer people received aid last year. Nothing says "global community" quite like shrinking the guest list by the population of France.
Aid contributions have been cut by 30% between 2022 and 2025, and thousands of aid workers have lost their jobs, making this one of the biggest contractions since the system was formed in the post-second world war era. The State of the Humanitarian System 2026 report, produced by the humanitarian organisation Active Learning Network for Accountability and Performance (Alnap), paints a picture of a system that is less "failing" and more "actively being dismantled."
In 2025, only those whose lives were in immediate danger became the focus, while support for longer-term issues and the ability to recover from crises was drastically scaled back. Because nothing says "efficiency" like waiting until someone is literally on fire before offering a bucket.
Jennifer Doherty, co-author of the report, said: "The impacts were not felt equally. The combination of reduced funding and restrictive politics meant women, children, elderly people and displaced people were especially hardest hit." Doherty also estimated that up to 23% of humanitarian staffing was lost in 2025, adding: "Specialised services closed and targeted support became harder to sustain." So, to recap: fewer people, less money, fewer staff. It's like a budget meeting where the only thing growing is the problem.
According to the report, funding fell to an estimated $33.3bn (£24.6bn) in 2025, from a peak of $47.5bn in 2022. USAID sustained the most dramatic cuts, with a 55% reduction in 2025, while 13 of the top 20 donors also reduced their aid donations last year. It's almost like they coordinated - except coordination is apparently something the international system struggles with.
The report also highlighted growing pressure from governments on how aid could be spent, such as the US spending freeze on programmes considered driven by diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policies. Because when you're starving, the first thing you check is whether the food came from a sufficiently non-woke supply chain.
For the few people who did receive support, the targeted amount per person dropped from $178 in 2021 to $90 in 2025, even as actual needs rose to $255. That's a budget shortfall of $165 per person, which is a fun way of saying "we've decided you need less than half of what you actually need."
An aggravating factor: governments not only failed in their duties to protect civilians but were often actually endangering people. States were responsible for 64% of attacks on healthcare workers and largely responsible for violence affecting aid workers through airstrikes. It's a bold strategy - bomb the hospitals, then wonder why health indicators plummet.
Yemen was one of the countries badly affected by aid cuts, with nutrition worsening and diphtheria cases rising because vaccination campaigns were suspended. Mohammed Bahashwan, Action for Humanity's country director in Yemen, said diminishing aid levels were exacerbating the crises faced by families. "Problems are not occurring separately," he said. "A family may have lost its income, be unable to afford food, have a malnourished child and still need to travel considerable distances or pay costs they cannot afford to access healthcare." In other words, the crises are holding hands and skipping together.
The report did note examples of the humanitarian system mobilising to support those most in need, often led by local aid organisations, and of diaspora networks stepping in. But it also said the international system did not coordinate well with these networks and that local aid organisations and staff were often worst affected by cuts. So the people doing the most are getting the least. Inspiring.
Meg Sattler, chief executive of the Vienna-based organisation Ground Truth Solutions, which carries out regular surveys of people who need aid, said there should be more focus on localisation because the international humanitarian system had not adapted fast enough or pushed back against the cuts and stipulations imposed by the US. "We have definitely spoken to people feeling the pinch of this contraction," she said. "It is especially causing distress where aid is now considered 'life-saving only' and isn't letting people do things such as send their kids to school or save to start a business - things that would help them be less reliant on aid in the future." Because apparently, the goal is now to keep people alive just enough to suffer, but not enough to thrive.