logo
Trump's funding cut stalls water projects, increasing risks for millions

Trump's funding cut stalls water projects, increasing risks for millions

Straits Times19-07-2025
FILE PHOTO: A child sleeps on plastic jerrycans as people queue at the standpipe, where incomplete water connections caused by USAID funding cuts to the NGO Mercy Corps have led to ongoing water shortages, in Goma, North Kivu province, Democratic Republic of Congo, June 16, 2025. REUTERS/Arlette Bashizi/File Photo
TAVETA, Kenya - The Trump administration's decision to slash nearly all U.S. foreign aid has left dozens of water and sanitation projects half-finished across the globe, creating new hazards for some of the people they were designed to benefit, Reuters has found.
Reuters has identified 21 unfinished projects in 16 countries after speaking to 17 sources familiar with the infrastructure plans. Most of these projects have not previously been reported.
With hundreds of millions of dollars in funding cancelled since January, workers have put down their shovels and left holes half dug and building supplies unguarded, according to interviews with U.S. and local officials and internal documents seen by Reuters.
As a result, millions of people who were promised clean drinking water and reliable sanitation facilities by the United States have been left to fend for themselves.
Water towers intended to serve schools and health clinics in Mali have been abandoned, according to two U.S. officials who spoke on condition of anonymity. In Nepal, construction was halted on more than 100 drinking water systems, leaving plumbing supplies and 6,500 bags of cement in local communities. The Himalayan nation will use its own funds to finish the job, according to the country's water minister Pradeep Yadav.
In Lebanon, a project to provide cheap solar power to water utilities was scrapped, costing some 70 people their jobs and halting plans to improve regional services. The utilities are now relying on diesel and other sources to power their services, said Suzy Hoayek, an adviser to Lebanon's energy ministry.
In Kenya, residents of Taita Taveta County say they are now more vulnerable to flooding than they had been before, as half-finished irrigation canals could collapse and sweep away crops. Community leaders say it will cost $2,000 to lower the risk – twice the average annual income in the area.
Top stories
Swipe. Select. Stay informed.
Singapore Mindef, SAF units among those dealing with attack on S'pore's critical information infrastructure
Asia China's growing cyber-hacking capabilities raise alarm around the world
Asia Autogate glitch causes chaos at KLIA and Johor checkpoints, foreign passport holders affected
Singapore A deadly cocktail: Easy access, lax attitudes driving Kpod scourge in S'pore
Singapore 'I thought it was an April Fool's joke': Teen addicted to Kpods on news that friend died
Singapore Who decides when you can't? A guide on planning for end-of-life care
Singapore Why hiring more teachers makes sense, even with falling student numbers
Singapore Bukit Panjang LRT disruption: Train service resumes after power fault affects 13-station line
"I have no protection from the flooding that the canal will now cause, the floods will definitely get worse," said farmer Mary Kibachia, 74.
BIPARTISAN SUPPORT
Trump's dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development has left life-saving food and medical aid rotting in warehouses and thrown humanitarian efforts around the world into turmoil. The cuts may cause an additional 14 million deaths by 2030, according to research published in The Lancet medical journal.
The Trump administration and its supporters argue that the United States should spend its money to benefit Americans at home rather than sending it abroad, and say USAID had strayed from its original mission by funding projects like LGBT rights in Serbia.
With an annual budget of $450 million, the U.S. water projects accounted for a small fraction of the $61 billion in foreign aid distributed by the United States last year.
Before Trump's reelection in November, the water projects had not been controversial in Washington. A 2014 law that doubled funding passed both chambers of Congress unanimously.
Advocates say the United States has over the years improved the lives of tens of millions of people by building pumps, irrigation canals, toilets and other water and sanitation projects. That means children are less likely to die of water-borne diseases like diarrhea, girls are more likely to stay in school, and young men are less likely to be recruited by extremist groups, said John Oldfield, a consultant and lobbyist for water infrastructure projects.
'Do we want girls carrying water on their heads for their families? Or do you want them carrying school books?' he said.
The U.S. State Department, which has taken over foreign aid from USAID, did not respond to a request for comment about the impact of halting the water projects.
The agency has restored some funding for life-saving projects, but Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said American assistance will be more limited going forward.
At least one water project has been restarted. Funding for a $6 billion desalination plant in Jordan was restored after a diplomatic push by King Abdullah.
But funding has not resumed for projects in other countries including Ethiopia, Tanzania, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, say people familiar with those programs who spoke on condition of anonymity.
That means women in those areas will have to walk for hours to collect unsafe water, children will face increased disease risk and health facilities will be shuttered, said Tjada D'Oyen McKenna, CEO of Mercy Corps, a nonprofit that worked with USAID on water projects in Congo, Nigeria and Afghanistan that were intended to benefit 1.7 million people.
'This isn't just the loss of aid — it's the unraveling of progress, stability, and human dignity,' she said.
THE PERILS OF FETCHING WATER
In eastern Congo, where fighting between Congolese forces and M23 rebels has claimed thousands of lives, defunct USAID water kiosks now serve as play areas for children.
Evelyne Mbaswa, 38, told Reuters her 16-year-old son went to fetch water in June and never came home – a familiar reality to families in the violence-wracked region.
'When we send young girls, they are raped, young boys are kidnapped.... All this is because of the lack of water,' the mother of nine said.
A spokesperson for the Congolese government did not respond to requests for comment.
In Kenya, USAID was in the midst of a five-year, $100 million project that aimed to provide drinking water and irrigation systems for 150,000 people when contractors and staffers were told in January to stop their work, according to internal documents seen by Reuters. Only 15% of the work had been completed at that point, according to a May 15 memo by DAI Global LLC, the contractor on the project.
That has left open trenches and deep holes that pose acute risks for children and livestock and left $100,000 worth of pipes, fencing and other materials exposed at construction sites, where they could degrade or be looted, according to other correspondence seen by Reuters. USAID signage at those sites makes clear who is responsible for the half-finished work, several memos say.
That could hurt the United States' reputation and potentially give a boost to extremist groups seeking fresh recruits in the region, according to a draft memo from the U.S. embassy in Nairobi to the State Department seen by Reuters.
The al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab group based in Somalia has been responsible for a string of high-profile attacks in Kenya, including an assault on a university in 2015 that killed at least 147 people.
"The reputational risk of not finishing these projects could turn into a security risk," the memo said.
DAMAGING FLOODS
In Kenya's Taita Taveta, a largely rural county that has endured cyclical drought and flooding, workers had only managed to build brick walls along 220 metres of the 3.1-kilometre (1.9 mile) irrigation canal when they were ordered to stop, community leaders said. And those walls have not been plastered, leaving them vulnerable to erosion.
'Without plaster, the walls will collapse in heavy rain, and the flow of water will lead to the destruction of farms,' said Juma Kobo, a community leader.
The community has asked the Kenyan government and international donors to help finish the job, at a projected cost of 68 million shillings ($526,000).
In the meantime, they plan to sell the cement and steel cables left on site, Kobo said, to raise money to plaster and backfill the canal.
The county government needs to find "funds to at least finish the project to the degree we can with the materials we have, if not complete it fully," said Stephen Kiteto Mwagoti, an irrigation officer working for the county.
The Kenyan government did not respond to a request for comment.
For Kibachia, who has lived with flooding for years, help cannot come soon enough.
Three months after work stopped on the project, her mud hut was flooded with thigh-deep water.
"It was really bad this time. I had to use soil to level the floor of my house and to patch up holes in the wall because of damage caused by the floods," she said.
'Where can I go? This is home.' REUTERS
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

EU reaches broad tariff deal with US to avert painful trade blow
EU reaches broad tariff deal with US to avert painful trade blow

Business Times

time33 minutes ago

  • Business Times

EU reaches broad tariff deal with US to avert painful trade blow

[LONDON/WASHINGTON] The US and European Union agreed on a hard-fought deal that will see the bloc face 15 per cent tariffs on most of its exports, including automobiles, staving off a trade war that could have delivered a hammer blow to the global economy. The pact was concluded less than a week before a Friday (Aug 1) deadline for US President Donald Trump's higher tariffs to take effect and was quickly praised by several European leaders, including German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, who called it 'sustainable'. Trump and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced the deal on Sunday at his golf club in Turnberry, Scotland, although they did not disclose the full details of the pact or release any written materials. 'It's the biggest of all the deals,' Trump said, while von der Leyen added it would bring 'stability' and 'predictability'. The euro advanced over all Group of 10 peers in early Sydney trading, with the spot up 0.3 per cent to 1.1773 after closing up 1 per cent last week. The deal would leave EU exports facing much higher tariffs than the bloc would charge for imports from the US, with von der Leyen saying the aim is to rebalance a trade surplus with the US. But those kinds of tradeoffs in the agreement angered some European industry groups, with Germany's main lobby saying it 'sends a fatal signal to the closely intertwined economies on both sides of the Atlantic'. BT in your inbox Start and end each day with the latest news stories and analyses delivered straight to your inbox. Sign Up Sign Up Von der Leyen and Trump also differed on some of the key terms of the deal they announced. The US president said the tariff level would apply to 'automobiles and everything else,' but not pharmaceuticals and metals. Steel and aluminium 'stays the way it is', the US president added, and drugs are 'unrelated to this deal'. The chief of the EU's executive arm said later at a news conference that the 15 per cent rate would be all inclusive, would not stack on top of industry-specific tariffs and would cover drugs, chips and cars. Metals duties 'will be cut and a quota system will be put in place,' she said. 'We have 15 per cent for pharmaceuticals. Whatever the decisions later on is, of the president of the US, how to deal with pharmaceuticals in general globally, that's on a different sheet of paper,' von der Leyen said, adding that the overall rate 'is not to be underestimated but it was the best we could get.' The EU agreed to purchase US$750 billion in American energy products, invest US$600 billion in the US on top of existing expenditures, open up countries' markets to trade with the US at zero tariffs and purchase 'vast amounts' of military equipment, Trump said. Von der Leyen said no decisions have been made on European wine and spirits, but the matter would be sorted out soon. Key to getting the 15 per cent rate to apply to pharmaceuticals and semiconductors was the bloc's promise to make US investments, according to sources familiar with the matter. Ahead of the meeting, the EU was expecting a 15 per cent charge on its imports to also apply to most pharmaceuticals. The products had been one of the negotiation's main sticking points. Without a deal, Bloomberg Economics estimated that the total US average effective tariff rate would rise to nearly 18 per cent on Aug 1 from 13.5 per cent under current policies. The new deal brings that number down to 16 per cent. For months, Trump has threatened most of the world with high tariffs with the goal of shrinking the US trade deficits. But the prospect of those duties, and Trump's unpredictable nature, put world capitals on edge. In May, he threatened to impose a 50 per cent duty on nearly all EU goods, adding pressure that accelerated negotiations, before lowering that to 30 per cent. The transatlantic pact removes a major risk for markets and the global economy, a trade war involving US$1.7 trillion worth of cross-border commerce, even though it means European shipments to the US are getting hit with a higher tax at the border. The goals, Trump said, were more production in the US and wider access for American exporters to the European market. Von der Leyen acknowledged part of the drive behind the talks was a reordering of trade, but cast it as beneficial for both sides. 'The starting point was an imbalance,' von der Leyen said. 'We wanted to rebalance the trade we made, and we wanted to do it in a way that trade goes on between the two of us across the Atlantic, because the two biggest economies should have a good trade flow.' The announcement capped off months of often tense shuttle diplomacy between Brussels and Washington. The two sides appeared close to a deal earlier this month when Trump made his 30 per cent threat. The EU had prepared to put levies on about 100 billion euros (S$151 billion), about a third of American exports to the bloc, if a deal was not reached and Trump followed through on his warning. US and European negotiators had been zeroing in on an agreement this past week, and the decision for von der Leyen to meet Trump at his signature golf property brought the standoff to a dramatic conclusion. Officials had discussed terms for a quota system for steel and aluminium imports, which would face a lower import tax below a certain threshold and would be charged the regular 50 per cent rate above it. The EU had also been seeking quotas and a cap on future industry-specific tariffs. The EU for weeks, indicated a willingness to accept an unbalanced pact involving a reduced rate of around 15 per cent, while seeking relief from levies on industries critical to the European economy. The US president has also imposed 25 per cent duties on cars and double that rate on steel and aluminium, as well as copper. Several exporters in Asia, including Indonesia, the Philippines and Japan, have negotiated reciprocal rates between 15 to 20 per cent, and the EU saw Japan's deal for 15 per cent on autos as a breakthrough worth seeking as well. Washington's talks also continue with Switzerland, South Korea and Taiwan. Trump said he is 'looking at deals with three or four other countries', but 'for the most part', others with smaller economies or less significant trading relationships with the US would receive letters simply setting tariff rates. Trump announced a range of tariffs on almost all US trading partners in April, declaring his intent to revive domestic manufacturing, help pay for a massive tax cut and address economic imbalances he has said are detrimental to US workers. He put them on pause a week later when investors panicked. Trump's decades-old complaints about the global trading system heap particularly sharp scorn on the EU, which he has accused of being formed to 'screw' the US. The bloc was established in the years following World War II in order to establish economic stability on the continent. The president has lashed out at non-tariff barriers for American companies to do business across the 27-nation bloc. Those include the EU's value-added tax, levies on digital services, and safety and environmental regulations. Weeks of negotiations tested the EU's willingness to digest what is seen as an asymmetrical outcome, a senior EU diplomat said, but one that offers an opportunity to continue the talks without escalating further. BLOOMBERG

Yemen's Houthis threaten to target ships linked to firms dealing with Israeli ports
Yemen's Houthis threaten to target ships linked to firms dealing with Israeli ports

Straits Times

time44 minutes ago

  • Straits Times

Yemen's Houthis threaten to target ships linked to firms dealing with Israeli ports

Yemen's Houthis said on Sunday they would target any ships belonging to companies that do business with Israeli ports, regardless of their nationalities, as part of what they called the fourth phase of their military operations against Israel. In a televised statement, the Houthis' military spokesperson warned that ships would be attacked if companies ignored their warnings, regardless of their destination. "The Yemeni Armed Forces call on all countries, if they want to avoid this escalation, to pressure the enemy to halt its aggression and lift the blockade on the Gaza Strip," he added. Since Israel's war in Gaza began in October 2023, the Iran-aligned Houthis have been attacking ships they deem as bound or linked to Israel in what they say are acts of solidarity with Palestinians. In May, the U.S. announced a surprise deal with the Houthis where it agreed to stop a bombing campaign against them in return for an end to shipping attacks, though the Houthis said the deal did not include sparing Israel. REUTERS

EU urges Ukraine to uphold independent anti-corruption bodies; Zelenskiy signals swift action
EU urges Ukraine to uphold independent anti-corruption bodies; Zelenskiy signals swift action

Straits Times

timean hour ago

  • Straits Times

EU urges Ukraine to uphold independent anti-corruption bodies; Zelenskiy signals swift action

Find out what's new on ST website and app. FILE PHOTO: European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen speaks with Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy prior to a bilateral meeting in Rome, Italy, April 26, 2025. Andrew Medichini/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo BRUSSELS - European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen called on Sunday for President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to uphold independent anti-corruption bodies, with the Ukrainian leader signaling that supporting legislation could be adopted within days. "Ukraine has already achieved a lot on its European path. It must build on these solid foundations and preserve independent anti-corruption bodies, which are cornerstones of Ukraine's rule of law," von der Leyen said in a post on X after a call with Zelenskiy. After a rare outburst of public criticism, Zelenskiy on Thursday submitted draft legislation to restore the independence of Ukraine's anti-corruption agencies - reversing course of an earlier bill aimed at stripping their autonomy. "I thanked the European Commission for the provided expertise," Zelenskiy said in a post on X after his Sunday call with von der Leyen. "We share the same vision: it is important that the bill is adopted without delay, as early as next week." Von der Leyen also promised continued support for Ukraine on its path to EU membership. "Ukraine can count on our support to deliver progress on its European path," she added. REUTERS Top stories Swipe. Select. Stay informed. Singapore Sewage shaft failure linked to sinkhole; PUB calling safety time-out on similar works islandwide Singapore Tanjong Katong Road sinkhole did not happen overnight: Experts Singapore Workers used nylon rope to rescue driver of car that fell into Tanjong Katong Road sinkhole Asia Singapore-only car washes will get business licences revoked, says Johor govt World Food airdropped into Gaza as Israel opens aid routes Sport Arsenal beat Newcastle in five-goal thriller to bring Singapore Festival of Football to a close Singapore Benchmark barrier: Six of her homeschooled kids had to retake the PSLE Asia S'porean trainee doctor in Melbourne arrested for allegedly filming colleagues in toilets since 2021

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store