Cash and food assistance
for war-affected households

Emergency program activated by

WFP and Ministry of Social Affairs

The Ministry of Social Affairs (MoSA), and the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) have activated an emergency cash assistance program to support war-affected families and are scaling up food assistance to face mass displacement and allow households to meet their immediate food needs.

The cash assistance will be delivered through the government’s existing Shock-Responsive Social Safety Net (SRSN) to enable rapid support. The first round of cash assistance will support nearly 50,000 families (about 183,000 people).

“In parallel with the activation of emergency cash assistance, WFP has been responding to the growing displacement. Within hours of shelters opening, WFP began providing hot meals, ready-to-eat rations and bread, reaching 40,000 people since the escalation started on Monday, in coordination with national authorities and humanitarian partners,” the ministry and WFP said in a joint statement. WFP has pre-positioned food stocks and is ready to scale up assistance as humanitarian needs evolve. It is also coordinating with the government, including the MoSA and national disaster response authorities to support affected households.

Haneen El Sayyed, Minister of Social Affairs, said: “With needs rising rapidly and displacement expanding across Lebanon, our priority is to ensure families can meet their most urgent basic needs with speed and dignity. Through the Ministry of Social Affairs, we have activated the government’s shock-responsive safety net to deliver emergency cash assistance to war-affected households, in close coordination with WFP and national response authorities. This is a government-led response, designed to reach people quickly, transparently, and at scale.”

Households who are not yet registered in existing assistance systems will be able to submit their information through a government-led registration platform, with a link to be announced soon.

Even before the latest escalation, nearly 874,000 people were already facing acute food insecurity – a number expected to increase further, according to recent food security analysis.