The World Food Programme has cut the monthly food aid for the Rohingyas in Bangladesh from $12.50 to $6 per person, beginning in April, raising the risk of widespread hunger in the Rohingya camps in Cox's Bazar and Bhashan Char.

"What they are receiving now is already not enough. So, it's hard to imagine the consequences of this new cut," Mohammed Mizanur Rahman, Refugee, Relief and Repatriation Commissioner, told news agency Reuters yesterday.

Rahman received the letter confirming the $6.60 cut from April 1 yesterday after being informed verbally the previous day.

A spokesperson for the UN World Food Programme in Dhaka did not immediately return a Reuters request for comment.

The WFP decision comes amid the Trump administration's termination of USAID funding worldwide. Initially, when the decision was announced in January, it was said that emergency food aid would remain out of the purview.

The WFP, however, did not specify in its letter if the reduction was due to the decision by the Trump administration, Rahman told Reuters.

But he said it was likely as the US was the top donor to the refugee response.

The US Embassy in Dhaka did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In the letter to the RRRC, seen by Reuters, the WFP said it had been trying to raise funds to keep the rations at $12.50 per month but had failed to find donors.

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A cut in rations to anything less than $6 would "fall below the minimum survival level and fail to meet basic dietary needs", it said.

The WFP said it accepted that "given the refugees' complete reliance on humanitarian aid", the cut would strain families struggling to meet basic needs and heighten "increasing tensions within the camps".

It said it had appealed to multiple donors for funding and that cost-saving measures alone were not enough.

"I have come to know that the UN is going to cut food ration for the Rohingyas -- this is shocking and very unfortunate," Khing Maung, a youth leader living in Kutupalong camp, told The Daily Star yesterday.

More than 1.1 million Rohingyas live in Cox's Bazar and Bhashanchar.

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"I appeal to the world community not to ignore us. We are already stateless and our wish to return to Myanmar is not materialising anytime soon," he said.

A previous round of ration cuts to Rohingyas in 2023 led to a sharp increase in hunger and malnutrition, according to the UN. The food rations were brought down to $8 a month then.

Within months, they said, 90 percent of the camp population "struggled to access an adequate diet" and more than 15 percent of children suffered from malnutrition, the highest rate recorded. The cut was later reversed.

Nearly 50 percent of the total humanitarian assistance for Rohingyas comes from the US government, Jashim Uddin, an NGO official working for a humanitarian project in Cox's Bazar, told this correspondent yesterday.

"Cutting this fund means a disaster for the Rohingya people," he said, adding that this will also impact the host communities in Cox's Bazar.

The Rohingya food items include rice, lentils, pangas fish and poultry, which is the bare minimum, he said.

"Earlier, there were more non-food items provided to the Rohingyas, but recently those items like soap were also reduced. Rohingyas used to sell some of the non-food items for food. With food aid cut, the nutrition level of the Rohingyas will drastically worsen," Jashim Uddin said.

With no job opportunities, many of the Rohingya youths go out of the camps for work, with some getting involved in drug and human trafficking, he said.

"I am afraid that with limited food aid, the Rohingyas would attempt to break out of the camps and snatch the locals' jobs," he said.

The Bangladesh authorities should take up the issue with the international community immediately, said an official of the RRRC office.