UN needs to cut $500m from 2026 budget and lose 20% of staff after US funding reductions

"The UN will need to cut $500m (about 370m) from next year's budget and lose 20% of its staff as it struggles to cope with a massive reduction in funding by the Trump administration. The plan, in gestation since Donald Trump started slashing his foreign aid budget, is likely to involve an initial minimum 3,000 job cuts out of a 35,000-strong main workforce. The overall UN core or regular budget would be cut from $3.7bn to about $3.2bn next year."

"Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state, for instance, has claimed: The postwar global order is not just obsolete, it is now a weapon being used against us. Unrwa, the UN's relief and works agency for Palestinian refugees, hands out bags of flour in Khan Younis in October 2024, prior to Israel's ban on its operation in Gaza. The US has ended funding for Unrwa and tried to close it down."

Budget reductions will force the UN to cut $500m and reduce its core budget from $3.7bn to about $3.2bn, requiring at least 3,000 layoffs and a 20% staff reduction across a 35,000-strong workforce. The cuts amount to 15.1% fewer resources and 18.8% fewer posts in the regular budget compared with 2025 and do not include reductions to peacekeeping, humanitarian and health agencies. US funding withdrawal has ended support for UNRWA. Persistent US antagonism constrains leadership options, while leadership plans to review bureaucracy aim to eliminate overlapping mandates across more than 140 entities and 40,000 prior resolutions.

Read at www.theguardian.com