One million women lose aid access due to funding cuts, UN Women says

As armed conflicts reach their highest levels in 80 years, organisations providing life-saving services to women and girls are running out of money. Beyond the Breaking Point, a new UN Women report published recently on the impact of aid cuts, finds that at least one million women and girls have lost access to critical support since January 2025.

The report is based on responses from 855 women-led and women’s rights organisations across 52 crisis-and conflict-affected countries.

“The women’s organisations at risk of being shut down are on the frontlines of the world’s most severe humanitarian crises. In countries including Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Haiti, they operate where international actors cannot and stay long after global attention has moved on. Every dollar withdrawn from women’s organisations is a dollar withdrawn from survivors of conflict-related sexual violence, displaced mothers, girls forced from school, and communities struggling to survive”, said Sofia Calltorp, UN Women Chief of Humanitarian Action.

The collapse of women’s organisations is happening as needs reach historic levels. Some 120 million women and girls require humanitarian assistance and protection worldwide and 84% of women’s organisations surveyed report that demand for their services has increased since January 2025. Nearly nine in 10 say they can no longer meet current levels of need. Two in five organisations surveyed expect to shut down, temporarily or permanently, within the next year.

To keep life-saving services afloat, women leading or working in the organisations surveyed are paying with their own labour, income, and wellbeing. Many are crisis-affected themselves. Sixty-five per cent of women-led organisations report staff working without pay to keep services running.

As organisations slip into survival mode, 48 per cent – nearly half – report rising burnout among their staff, while 88 per cent say the mental health of the women and girls they serve is deteriorating.