The UN and partners are seeking $23 billion to provide lifesaving support in 2026 to 87 million people worldwide affected by war, climate disasters, earthquakes, epidemics and crop failures.

This is the immediate priority of the 33 billion Global Humanitarian Overview 2026, launched on Monday, which aims to reach 135 million people overall in 50 countries.

“This appeal sets out where we need to focus our collective energy first: life by life,” UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher said.

The updated GHO follows a year marked by brutal cuts to humanitarian operations and a record number of deadly attacks against aid workers. It includes 29 detailed plans, and the largest is for the Occupied Palestinian Territory, where $4.1 billion is needed to reach some three million people.

In Sudan, $2.9 billion is required to provide lifesaving aid to 20 million people caught in the world’s largest displacement crisis, with another $2 billion for the seven million Sudanese who have fled the country. The largest regional plan is for Syria, at $2.8 billion for 8.6 million people.

Fletcher recalled that the 2025 appeal received only $12 billion – the lowest funding in a decade.  As a result, humanitarians reached 25 million fewer people than during the previous year.

The consequences were immediate, including rising hunger and strained health systems. 

“Even as famines hit parts of Sudan and Gaza,” he said at a news conference before this year’s launch. “Programmes to protect women and girls were slashed, hundreds of aid organisations shut. And over 380 aid workers were killed – the highest on record.”

The UN relief chief described humanitarians as “overstretched, underfunded and under attack”, something he has stressed on several occasions.

“Only 20 per cent of our appeals are supported. And we drive the ambulance towards the fire on your behalf,” he said. “But we are also now being asked to put the fire out. And there is not enough water in the tank. And we are being shot at.”

Humanitarians will now take the appeal to UN member states and ask for their backing.

This will happen over the next 87 days, “one for each of the million lives that we will set out to save”, he stated.

He pointed out that countries will also be urged to step up protection for humanitarians, “not with statements of concern, but by holding to account those killing us – and those arming those killing us”. 

(NAN)