Kabul, Afghanistan – A growing nutritional emergency in Afghanistan is threatening the lives of millions of children, with families struggling to afford basic necessities amid worsening economic conditions.
Seyda, a mother from Nangarhar province, is currently at Indira Gandhi Children’s Hospital in Kabul, watching helplessly as her infant battles severe malnutrition. For six months, Seyda has tried everything to help her child recover, but poverty has placed vital treatment out of reach.
“I’m from Jalalabad. My child has been malnourished for four months,” she says. “My husband collects scrap to make a living. We can’t manage anymore. Our financial situation is terrible — we can’t even afford milk.”
Sabera, a mother from Helmand province, echoes the same despair. “It’s been two or three months since my child fell ill. He was hospitalized for a month in Helmand. I tried to continue treatment at home, but it didn’t work. Now, I’ve brought him to Kabul because I had no other choice.”
These are not isolated stories — they reflect a growing crisis across the country.
According to a recent report by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), one in every two Afghan children suffers from some form of malnutrition. The agency highlights that Afghanistan ranks fourth globally in terms of food insecurity, with an alarming 90% of children under five lacking access to sufficient and nutritious food.
Tajudeen Oyewale, UNICEF’s representative in Afghanistan, stated:
“Nearly half of all Afghan children under five suffer from stunting or chronic malnutrition, and 10.3% are wasted — meaning they have dangerously low weight for their height. According to our latest report, Afghanistan is among the most severely impacted countries in the world when it comes to child food insecurity.”
Globally, around 440 million children under five suffer from food insecurity, with Afghanistan among the most critically affected.
To address the crisis, UNICEF recently launched the ‘First Foods’ strategy — a locally focused initiative aiming to improve child nutrition by promoting locally produced and processed nutritious foods. The strategy also emphasizes education for families on proper dietary practices and aims to support sustainable, home-based nutrition solutions.
“This initiative will help ensure proper dietary combinations for children at the household level,” Oyewale added. “We believe this is the best approach to reduce malnutrition through a preventative strategy rather than emergency interventions.”
The growing concern over child and maternal malnutrition comes amid repeated warnings from UN agencies and humanitarian organizations. They are urgently calling on the international community to act collectively to prevent a worsening humanitarian disaster.
With Afghanistan’s fragile healthcare system already overwhelmed and economic hardship deepening across rural and urban areas alike, immediate and coordinated action is needed to safeguard the country’s most vulnerable population: its children.
For more on this story and related reports, visit www.u.af.
