US Suspends Food Aid to Ethiopia Due to Widespread Theft and Diversion Scheme

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has suspended all food aid to Ethiopia after an internal investigation found that donated food intended for millions of hungry people was being diverted on a “widespread” scale. The US is the biggest single donor to Ethiopia, providing $1.8 billion in humanitarian assistance, including food aid, in the 2022 fiscal year. An internal memo prepared by a group of humanitarian donors pointed to the involvement of Ethiopia’s federal government in the diversion of food aid. The USAID announcement comes after both USAID and the United Nations World Food Program last month said they had suspended aid to Ethiopia's northern Tigray region while they investigated allegations of food aid theft.