Can AI save millions from famine? Carl Skau reveals UNWFP’s plan to battle a crippling crisis due to funding cuts by Western countries

Carl Skau: Around 300 million people are acutely food insecure. Those are people who have been hit by shock, or conflict or an extreme weather event and don’t know where the next meal is going to come from. At the same time, the resources to try to address and help and assist these people have come down dramatically.

We saw a 40 per cent drop only last year, and this year it is very unpredictable what the resource level will be. Then on top of that it is an ever more complex political environment that we navigate… We have never seen as many colleagues killed in the line of duty on the front lines.

I will be going to Ukraine next week… We are assisting almost a million people every month in what we call frontline areas, which are 30 kilometres from the active fighting. The same in Sudan, where the fighting is really intense now in parts of the country in Kordofan, where we see front lines shifting back and forth, and hundreds of thousands of civilians are caught up in that fighting, and where we have famine still confirmed.

Fingers crossed in Gaza that the ceasefire holds and that we move into a second phase. We have been able to take advantage of the ceasefire so far. We are now helping almost 1.5 million Palestinians in Gaza every month; our operation is fully operational. We have stabilised the food security situation, but overall, the situation is brutal for people and unsustainable.

Looking ahead five years, it is very difficult. I think the world is in a flux at the moment, and we don’t know what is going to come next.

Q. You talked about 40 per cent cut in funding. What is the amount of funding cut in absolute terms?

Carl Skau: In 2024, we had a budget of $10 billion. Last year, we landed around $6.4 billion, and this year, we are aiming for $6 billion. We had to lay off almost 6,000 people last year, and, more importantly, we have had to cut off many, many people from our assistance. So, in a place like Afghanistan, we have e gone from supporting 8 million people to only 2 million people.

Heading into this winter, it is terrible to say, but children will die because of these cuts. It has been really painful. We are trying to be as smart as possible, and AI helps us do that by enabling us to anticipate crises, look around the corner, understand what will happen next, and intervene early. That saves a lot of money, a lot of lives, especially when we look at extreme weather events.

We want to be faster, and AI helps us with that as well, because it can analyse large datasets quickly, helping us target the most vulnerable in crisis settings and making us more efficient. So, we have a massive procurement and supply chain, and through AI, we have been able to optimise it. So, we are saving millions of dollars that are then going back into programmes, and it means that we are able to save more lives and put more food on the table for vulnerable people.

Q. So how much of this, you know, redaction in funding is caused by US President Donald Trump’s decision to shut down USAID?

Carl Skau: Well, It is in part, but it is not everything. Because we have traditionally been funded by 10-15 predominantly Western countries, all of which have been cutting assistance. So, in Europe as well, support has been declining since then, as investments have been made in defence and other areas.

Q. What is the number of people you could have supported if there had been no cut in funding?

Carl Skau: Globally, we hope to reach some 100 million people this year. It would be down from targeted 140-150 million people… In some places, we decide to cut rations. We are reaching 100 million people, but we are not providing the support we would have if we had full funding. We have that situation in Sudan now, for example, where we are supporting 5 million people. But we have had to cut rations.

So, for those in the most acute areas of conflict, we are giving them 70 per cent of what they need, and for those not at the very epicentre of the conflict, we are giving them 50 per cent of what they need… We have pockets in the north of South Sudan, where due to conflict, but also due to rains, we are not able to reach those communities by any other means than by airdrops, airplanes that drop food into communities.

These are communities facing starvation. And the only way to get there is by airdrop. Now, airdrops are expensive, and so we have not been able to do that, you know, for a couple of months in South Sudan. My colleagues who have been working in this for 40-50 years cannot recall it ever being the case before. If there has been starvation, we have never, for lack of money, stopped ourselves from getting there and helping them. So it is a new situation.

Q. India has agreed to supply 2 lakh tonnes of fortified rice for humanitarian needs. How much of this has been supplied so far? Have you asked the Indian Government to raise this quantity?

Carl Skau: The deal we have is that we do procurement. We buy food. It gives us affordable pricing and that is helpful. I think we are also discussing with the government that they are generously providing bilateral support to some countries— Myanmar and Afghanistan. We would like to tap into that, to also be part of that..To see if India can also be a contributor to our programs.

Q. India donated 50,000 metric tonnes of wheat to Afghanistan through the WFP. How do you ensure that such aid reaches the intended beneficiaries and is not diverted to individuals linked to the ruling Taliban?

Carl Skau: We do our own targeting and deliver independently to those in greatest need. Of course, sharing information with authorities, often in coordination with them, but they don’t dictate who we give food to or how we give it.

The challenge we have in Afghanistan is really these regulations that make it difficult for the women in our workforce to work, and this is something that we are actively engaging the Taliban authorities around, because that is unacceptable to us. And so all our female colleagues continue to work for us, but they do so under increasing risk.

Q. The WFP works with governments on school meal programmes. India has had the midday meal programme for decades now, but ensuring quality and meeting nutritional norms remains a challenge. How do you think governments can better monitor and ensure quality in school meal programmes?

Carl Skau: That is the next phase… Accessibility is quite impressive… To see how it has progressed here in India. But of course, the next phase would be to make sure the right foods are available to children. What is notable about school meals is that they don’t just provide a meal a day to everyone. It also helps bring children to school, especially girls, often in the poorest areas.

This is something that provides an incentive for parents to send their kids to school. So, it really enhances the schooling rate. Then it improves educational outcomes. If you have hungry kids, they don’t learn as well. Our approach is to procure locally within the community. It supports small and medium-sized farmers in the community. It is a concept that has so many positive effects.

Here, India is a source of inspiration. When the President of Indonesia invited us to support them in rolling out a school meal program, we said, “Let’s go to India to see if there are lessons we can draw on.” We facilitated contact between India and Indonesia at the time. I hope that BRICS…the work that India is now leading under the BRICS…that they could put school meals on the agenda in that effort. Let us hope that it can become one of the big themes for this year’s BRICS leadership.

Q. How do you think governments can better prepare for crisis situations like Covid when restrictions threaten regular school meal distribution?

Carl Skau: It is a difficult question. I think we all learnt a lot through Covid. I hope those lessons are, you know, being brought to bear and that we are better prepared should something similar happen. In many countries, school meals were the only thing that was still working. We walked into many, many challenges during the Covid crisis. I hope the lesson from that has been learned, so we are more resilient.