UNICEF's 2024 appeal cut 16% from last year due to underfunding woes: Deputy executive director

By Beyza Binnur Donmez

GENEVA (AA) - The United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF) on Friday said that its $9.3 billion appeal for next year represents a 16% decrease compared to 2023 due to underfunding the agency has faced.

"At a time when humanitarian protection need have never been greater, we are concerned that our ability to meet these needs is going to come under increasing strain among the most critically underfunded emergencies," Ted Chaiban, UNICEF’s deputy executive director, told a UN press briefing in Geneva.

He added: "So the appeal this year of $9.3 billion is actually a 16% decrease from what we appealed for last year, not because needs have decreased, but because we've really tried to focus on how we can be most effective in responding to those needs where it's absolutely essential that UNICEF is the best place to respond to those needs,"

On the most critically underfunded emergencies, he said they include Sudan, Burkina Faso, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Myanmar, Haiti, Ethiopia, Yemen, Somalia, South Sudan, and Bangladesh.

"They need continued access to essential services like health care, safe water, basic sanitation, education and protection," he stressed.

The world is witnessing a growing demand in a financially constrained environment that is being further destabilized by conflicts and climate change, compounded by the lingering effects of COVID-19 and its economic aftermath, said Chaiban.

“I think what we're seeing is increased need in a fiscally tight space affected by increasing instability because of conflict and climate, the overhang of COVID, and the economic consequences of COVID,” he explained.

On Tuesday, UNICEF launched a $9.3 billion emergency funding appeal for 2024 to reach at least 93.7 million children in 155 countries.