Imagine leaving your home overnight. Not by choice, rather, because staying meant that you are risking your own life. You witness others suffering from the consequences of armed conflict, geopolitical tensions, and wars. This forces you to grab whatever you can carry, cross a border, and arrive in a foreign country exhausted, terrified, wounded, and starving. This is not a story of one, this is a story of hundreds of thousands of refugees, asylum-seekers, and vulnerable migrants. For hundreds of thousands of people who have fled the conflict in Sudan, those who fled Gaza post-2023, and refugees from other part of the region, this is not a hypothetical, rather, their daily reality.

This is where the Egyptian Food Bank (EFB) intervenes quietly, consistently, and with a span of operations that goes nationwide to ensure the food security of thousands of refugees with a focus on Palestinians, Sudanese, and Yemenis.

 

Egypt’s Refugee Crisis: The Humanitarian Situation Context

To fully grasp the situation in Egypt and the scope of the EFB’s operations, we must delve into and picture the scale of what Egypt is dealing with. As of early 2026, Egypt hosts more than 941,000 registered refugees and asylum-seekers from around 61 nationalities, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). The real number, if we include the unregistered refugees and asylum-seekers, is significantly higher than this. This made Egypt, in relatively a short period of time, one of the most significant refugee-hosting countries in the Middle East and North African (MENA) region. As we explore this further, these groups come with their stories of violence, trauma, and loss and at the EFB we work extensively with three of those groups and communities that are explored below.

A) The Sudanese Crisis: An Overflow of the Largest Refugee Group

The single largest group of refugees and asylum-seekers in Egypt. Since the conflict erupted in Sudan in April 2023, over 1.2 million Sudanese have crossed the borders into Egypt. As of March 2026, the UNHCR registered around, if not more, 672,930 Sudanese refugees and asylum-seekers who come at an excruciatingly vulnerable status which requires a huge set of services to be delivered to not only host but to care for them. As the families arrived with almost nothing, malnourished, and challenged by the mere adaptation to a completely different reality, humanitarian organisations often find themselves in a situation in which services must be provided properly, and more importantly swiftly.

Almost 76% of the newly registered Sudanese arrivals are women and children, a target group that is characterised by a higher level of vulnerability, what’s more, around 40% of Egypt’s entire registered refugee population are children. Egypt’s current economic challenges, with the current inflation that averages between 35% - 40% between 2022-2024, have made the circumstances even more dire for refugees to be able to buy basic staples such as bread, rice, sugar, and cooking oil, which is becoming more increasingly unaffordable for them and the Egyptian families hosting them.

B) Palestinians from Gaza: Post the 7^th of October

Egypt has become the primary destination for Palestinians after the 7^th of October 2023. Over 130,000 people, which includes around 30,000 children, have fled Gaza amidst the conflict to seek safety and medical care. That being said, the Palestinian Authority (PA) have estimated that there are around 100,000 Gazans living in Egypt as of mid-2024. Palestinians have been residing mainly in Cairo, however, upon the conflict, some have been residing in North Sinai for medical care as medical evacuees.

The situation here is different, given that Egypt does not regard Palestinians as refugees, nearly all the arrivals are registered as short-term entry tourist visas. Consequently, the food insecurity for the Palestinians in Egypt who fled the war is acute, without the ability to work and with their tourist visa restrictions they get limited access to services which entails that the families rely on donations and assistance from diaspora communities, NGOs, humanitarian aid organisations, and grassroot aid groups. Here, the EFB has played a vital role that can be characterised as being direct and swift, one can check the EFB’s presence on the Egyptian National TV series named ‘’Ashab Al-Ard’’ which was aired in Ramadan of this year, as it dispatched over 150 trucks and more than 7,000 tons of food supplies to the Gaza strip while also making sure to provide support for Gazans who have resided in Egypt.

C) Yemenis: An Often Overlooked Deeply Vulnerable Community

Yemen’s conflict has been going on for almost eleven years now and it remains one of the most forgotten humanitarian disasters. What’s more challenging is the fact that Yemenis in Yemen are facing a food insecurity crisis and more than 4.5 million are internally displaced. A smaller number, over the years, have sought safety away from their homeland, with Egypt as a destination country.

As of March 2025, the UNHCR have registered almost 8,255 Yemeni refugees and asylum-seekers, a small number compared to almost any other nationality especially if we put the Sudanese or the Syrians. For the EFB, the Yemenis are supported through the Monthly Feeding Programme, an essential support system provided by the EFB to Yemenis through the collaboration with Yemen Foundation for Cancer Patients and Charity Work.

How the EFB Reaches Those Vulnerable Target Groups: The Designed Programmes and Operations

Given the above-mentioned target groups and context, the EFB has adapted its programme and expanded its operations to serve refugees, asylum-seekers, and vulnerable migrants and here is what it looks like in practice:

1. The Monthly Feeding Programme

Based on providing regular food boxes with dry staples such as rice, beans, sugar, pasta, and cooking oil. These boxes are not distributed indiscriminately, rather, a comprehensive and analytical social assessment is conducted to verify who needs the assistance the most. Thus, the priority is given to the following:

·         The elderly

·         Single mothers with young children

·         People with disabilities (PWDs)

·         Refugees and asylum-seekers

·         The severely vulnerable families economically.

The aforementioned target groups do fall under the eligible categories of this programme as it is considered a critical lifeline to rely on since they have no safety net that supports them.

2. Emergency Response and Humanitarian Intervention

As mentioned previously, the EFB has been one of the most active humanitarian entities that provided support during the conflict in Gaza. Notably, the EFB often mobilises its resources rapidly to provide humanitarian aid during a refugee crisis whether that was during the Gaza conflict or the war in Sudan. Given that it is part of the National Alliance for Civil Development Work which coordinated humanitarian aid delivery, the EFB has extended its operations to work alongside the FAO, UNHCR, and the WFP.

3. Advocacy and Research: Establishing an Evidence-based Basis for The EFB

Feeding vulnerable target groups is the most immediate task carried out by the EFB, nonetheless, sustainability is vital and change requires more than food boxes. Therefore, the EFB has evolved to become an evidence-based organisations driven by impact and its function now is characterised by evidence-based research that empowers its operations. One example is the EFB’s partnership with the Sawiris Foundation for Social Development and the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) to host events like the Bridging Evidence and Policy (BEP) which had experts, scholars, academics, development practitioners, UN officials, government officials, and policy makers. This did not only target the vulnerable Egyptian target groups but also highlighted the salience of assisting displaced target groups such as Palestinians and Sudanese.

Understand the EFB So You Can Support It

Food is more than just a meal or a box, but it is also dignity, security, and warmth. This is not a conversation about the consumption of calories, nor is it a discussion about what to eat, rather, it is a reminder that once those refugees from any of the 61 nationalities that reside in Egypt are offered support, they know that they are receiving a message of being seen and that they are not alone.

In a region that is witnessing acute humanitarian crises and turbulent geopolitical occurrences, the Egyptian Food Bank represents something crucial: an organisation that still finds the opportunity to face overwhelming challenges with innovation, perseverance, and strong belief that no one is left behind.

Understanding the EFB, or almost anything in this world, is the first step towards supporting it and once that is the case, one acknowledges that behind every box or meal there is a family that tries to survive and every act of giving helps make it possible.