U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres travelled to Bangladesh back in March, aiming to push the Rohingya crisis back onto the international agenda. He visited the refugee camps during the trip, accompanied by Dr. Muhammad Yunus, the chief adviser to Bangladesh’s interim government.
A separate high-level meeting on the Rohingya situation convened at the U.N. General Assembly hall in September. Chief Adviser Dr. Yunus attended the gathering, which, according to his press wing, drew representatives from at least 75 countries and organisations. Senior officials from the interim government, including the foreign affairs adviser, have since repeated calls on various platforms for a political solution. They also urged increased humanitarian aid. Those appeals have drawn little response. International support this year for the Rohingya community in Bangladesh has fallen to less than half of what is required.
The sharp drop in funding has pushed the camps in Cox’s Bazar into a wider crisis that goes beyond food and medical shortages. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs reports that the Joint Response Plan 2025 requires $934.5 million. As of December 2, it had secured only $464.4 million — 49.7 percent of the total required. The shortfall stands at roughly $470 million. Last year, the plan sought $852.4 million. It received only $546.6 million, or 64.1 percent, underscoring a notable decline in international aid this year.
Reduced global funding has strained almost every essential service in the camps, including food assistance, nutrition, health care, clean water, sanitation, shelter, and education. Analysts warn that a continued slide could push the crisis into a dangerous phase and expose Bangladesh to greater risks.
Nearly 1.2 million Rohingya forcefully displaced from Myanmar now live in Bangladesh, mainly in camps in Cox’s Bazar and on Bhasan Char. International aid covers most of the costs for their food, schooling, and skills training. With that support reduced, the camps have sunk into a deepening humanitarian crisis. The Guardian recently reported that humanitarian funding is shrinking worldwide. New conflicts, disasters, and shifting political priorities were cited as the reasons behind that decrease. Many donors have pulled back, prompting cuts across the Rohingya response in food supplies, nutrition, health care, education, and shelter. Basic items such as infant formula, cleaning materials for latrines, and even medicines now arrive irregularly.
Analysts warn that Rohingya will face a prolonged crisis with almost no means to withstand it unless donors quickly step up support. A continued decline, they say, would push children born under the canvas roofs of Cox’s Bazar camps toward a future extremely uncertain with no assurance of food, health care, schooling, or other basic needs.
Researcher and political analyst Altaf Parvez argues that shrinking aid is pushing Bangladesh toward new and deeper risks. “Support has already fallen, and it will fall further,” he told Bonik Barta. “Fresh arrivals are making the situation even more complicated. The first and most immediate pressure is economic, and it will grow. Struggling to survive, many will take informal work outside the camps and spread into surrounding areas. Attempts to leave the country through irregular routes will increase. Smuggling and drug trafficking may rise. A larger worry is radicalisation. If aid drops and frustration builds, some young Rohingya could become more drawn to extremist or violent groups.”
The funding shortfall has already cut services across the camps. Many health centres have closed or now operate with limited capacity. Maternal care, surgery, and paediatric emergency services all face acute shortages. UNICEF’s nutrition centre in Camp 15 screens 300 children a day for severe malnutrition. It shows the number of undernourished children has risen 11 percent since 2024. Newborns are entering the world in conditions where saline, vitamin A, and ready-to-use therapeutic food are scarce.
Pregnant women are also facing challenges. Reduced rations have halved the food supply for many families. Mothers lack protein-rich meals and even basic materials for safe delivery. Low-weight births are increasing. Many infants face severe malnutrition within their first week of life.
The strain has reached every corner of camp life, far beyond food and health care. Safe water is running short. Sanitation systems are breaking down. In many blocks, the supply of soap and basic hygiene materials has stopped altogether. Tarpaulin-and-bamboo shelters have decayed without maintenance and now sit exposed to collapse in the next storm. Cuts to the education budget have also reduced community learning spaces. Aid officials warn that without fresh funding, the situation could tip into a far more dangerous phase. The impact would not fall on the Rohingya community alone. It would ripple across Cox’s Bazar and its local economy.
Tanbirul Miraj Ripon, a journalist who has covered the Myanmar-Bangladesh border for nearly eight years, said assistance is thinning to the point of vanishing. “Education, health, nutrition — support is almost shutting down,” he told Bonik Barta. “The effects may not show immediately, but the collapse will turn into a serious humanitarian crisis. Once education stops, the problem goes beyond learning losses. It will create a deep divide in skills, and that makes conflict between camp youth and local communities more likely.”
He noted that the children who fled in 2017 at age five or six are now teenagers. With no way to acquire skills, many are entering adulthood jobless. He added, “Extremist groups still active in the region will look for an opening. Training programmes that once helped Rohingya gain basic skills have nearly disappeared. So they are not becoming part of any skilled workforce. On the contrary, drug traffickers will find this population even easier to recruit. If aid keeps falling, the social fallout will be severe.”
Aid officials say the downturn is accelerating. Major donors, including the United States, have already pared back contributions. If this continues, support will shrink further, raising the prospect of returning to the turmoil seen before 2017. The world is gradually looking away from the Rohingya crisis, and that is posing the greatest risk. Experts warn it would not only intensify hardship for the Rohingya community but also heighten the risk of the population dispersing beyond the camps.