On 20 January 2025, the US administration under President Donald Trump issued an executive order suspending all foreign aid disbursements and programs, pending a 90-day review, and shortly after began issuing stop-work orders. The following week, on 28 January, Secretary of State Marco Rubio issued a waiver for “existing lifesaving humanitarian assistance programs”, although it remains unclear exactly how these criteria are applied.
The developments have already had a profound impact on Afghanistan, which remains heavily dependent on US aid. Since the Taliban’s return to power in 2021, an economic crisis has intensified as banking services were initially suspended, while donors suspended all development and security assistance.
According to the UN Financial Tracking Service, the US accounted for 43.7% of the USD1.71 billion of foreign funding to Afghanistan in 2024, and has provided almost two-thirds (63.5%) of what has been disbursed so far in 2025. Following the US aid suspension, several aid agencies have reportedly already halted or scaled back operations. This report provides a snapshot of the impact on both the aid sector and the Afghan economy, although the full consequences are likely to be much broader.
Aid suspensions and closures of NGOs
According to an analysis by ACAPS, the overall impact of the funding suspension on Afghanistan is likely to be significant, although the full scale depends on how the “humanitarian waiver” is applied. Some international actors have, however, already spoken publicly of likely consequences.
On 4 February 2025, UN agencies stated that 9 million people in Afghanistan were anticipated to lose access to health and protection services. The report added that 600 mobile health teams, family health houses and counselling centres will be suspended as a result.
Pio Smith, Asia-Pacific Director of United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), further told Deutsche Welle (DW) that the freeze could lead to 1,200 more deaths of women from pregnancy complications by 2028. Similarly, the World Food Programme (WFP) in Afghanistan informed Reuters that more than 6 million people in urgent need of food aid would not receive rations.
Several local and national NGOs have already scaled back or ceased operations. The Organisation for Research and Community Development (ORCD), for example, stopped providing health services for mothers and children in Paktia, according to 8am Media. The outlet reported that the suspension of ORCD’s activities — which were US-funded, through an UNFPA subgrant — had affected thousands of families in the province.
According to an 8am Media report, 10 aid agencies had suspended operations in Ghazni province following the halt in US funding. The agencies reportedly served thousands in rural areas of the province in the education, agriculture, and health sectors. Locals said the closures had also led to job losses, including for women.
The Taliban’s Deputy Economy Minister, Abdul Latif Nazari, admitted to the media on 29 January 2025 that more than 50 organisations ceased operations in 28 provinces, affecting the health, agriculture, education, and disaster management sectors.
Separately, Reuters reported that Disaster Assistance Response Teams (DARTs) could no longer function in Afghanistan. These teams had provided support to prevent the spread of pandemics, and assistance with famine prevention post-earthquake disaster management.
Impact on families
Residents of the Arghandab district of Zabul province also told Amu TV that the funding suspension had already led to reduced access to healthcare and medicine. One mother interviewed said she could not obtain the medicines she needed since several healthcare centres were closed, while another mother said that she now had to turn to private healthcare clinics which she could not afford.
On 8 February 2025, Amu TV reported on how the aid freeze has affected livelihoods. One woman interviewed, Zuhra, said she had lost her job as a dressmaker in a US-funded facility, an income her family had been dependent on. Another woman quoted in the same report claimed that her family (including her disabled husband and six daughters) had been dependent on monthly payments from an aid organisation whose operations stopped in January 2025, leaving them unable to afford food.
Currency devaluation and rising price of goods
The US announcement has had wider implications for the Afghan economy, including by causing the Afghani to drop sharply. The Afghan currency depreciated from AFN 70 to the USD in early January 2025 to AFN 78.8 in the final week of January 2025. This has increased the prices of basic goods such as food, impacting poorer families in particular.
Fariba, a woman feeding a family of five, told Azadi Radio on 7 February 2025 that she could hardly afford basic items such as flour, rice, and cooking oil following the rise in prices. A resident of Kabul, Shafiullah, was also quoted in the report saying his family could barely afford one meal per day, as a sack of flour had increased from AFN 1,400 to 1,800 (GBP 15 to 20) in two weeks.
Responses by the Taliban: defiance and apparent budget cuts
In response to early reports of possible aid suspensions, the Taliban Deputy Spokesman Hamdullah Fitrat initially reacted defiantly, writing on 8 January 2025 that the Taliban had neither sought nor anticipated aid. Fitrat also claimed that much US funding had actually been used for the repatriation of US citizens and Afghans, and said it has been misreported as humanitarian aid.
This Taliban posture, however, did not last long. Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi, in an interview with the BBC, admitted that people and the country would be impacted by the pause in US aid, but expressed hopes that the effects would be minimal. Deputy Economy Minister Abdul Latif Nazari urged the international community, including the US, to refrain from politicising humanitarian aid.
There were also reports that the aid suspension had affected state finances, even though US aid is “off budget” and not provided directly to the de facto Taliban state institutions. In late January 2025, the Taliban reportedly stopped paying salaries to government employees to mitigate the impact of aid freeze.
Several government employees told Azadi Radio that the Taliban had delayed their payments until further notice, with one employee even claiming the delay could be extended for three-four months. Similarly, a school teacher and several civil service employees told Etilaat-e-Roz that they were not paid their December 2024 salaries.
Taliban spokesperson Zabiullah Mujahid wrote on X on 30 January 2025 that all 1.4 million government employees would be paid their January salaries, adding that the pause in foreign aid would not affect the country’s budget. However, a separate post from Mujahid from 7 February 2025 suggests that the government employees were yet to receive their December 2024 payments.
On 28 January 2025, Afghanistan International reported that the Taliban had halted government procurement due to the funding suspension. The report also quoted three government employees who claimed their salaries had been suspended for the coming three months.
A memo from the Taliban Finance Ministry dated 13 February 2025, obtained by the Afghan Green Trend — run by former Afghan Vice President Amrullah Saleh — notified Taliban government departments that certain expenses, such as the purchase of vehicles, furniture, and any other decoration and office items, were not going to be paid by the ministry until at least the end of the current Afghan year (21 March 2025).
Meanwhile, to alleviate the declining value of the Afghan currency, particularly against the US Dollars (USD), the Taliban have reportedly tried to inject more dollars into the national economy. Since 18 January 2025, the Central Bank of Afghanistan has sold 120 million USD in auctions, allowing businesses and banks to meet demands for foreign currency. This has reportedly led the Afghani’s value to strengthen against the dollar from a high of 89 to 73/74. The Taliban also reportedly prevented the usual USD auctions inside the Afghan money exchange market (Sarai Shahzada) in Kabul, claiming the auctioneers destabilised the exchange rate.
Other reports suggest that the Taliban Supreme Leader had called a high-level meeting in Kandahar to discuss the economic impacts of the US aid suspension.
Furthermore, the Taliban seemingly invited Mirwais Azizi, an Afghan investor based in the United Arab Emirates, to Kabul in late February 2025. The Taliban’s public communications on the visit highlighted Azizi’s reported future investments in Afghanistan, a possible attempt to allay public fears about the US aid freeze’s wider impact. Azizi has a reported net worth of over USD 10 billion and owns the Azizi Group chain of businesses, including Aziz Bank, Ghazanfar Bank, Azizi Construction, and other businesses in Afghanistan and the Middle East.
