Since he became president in January 2025, Donald Trump withdrew the US from the World Health Organization (WHO), and cut funding for other UN agencies and NGOs as well – including the International Organization for Migration (IOM) – as well as a number of other Geneva-based agencies and NGOs.
This has led to the loss of hundreds of jobs already but, according to Geneva Solutions, the media outlet dedicated to the city’s international sector, this is just the tip of the iceberg.
The media outlet has already noticed a 43-percent drop in the number of people hired at the UN compared to last year, particularly for long-term, full-time assignments.
READ ALSO: How Geneva would be hit hard by Trump's withdrawal from UN agencies
“The UN is facing an existential crisis,” Geneva Solutions pointed out. “Humanitarian agencies have already laid off thousands of staff, while programmes in some of the most fragile settings in the world have already been slashed.”
This is the extent of expected job losses; further cuts will follow:
UN AIDS
The most dramatic cuts affect the UN AIDS programme. Staff at the agency's Geneva headquarters will shrink from 127 to 19 employees.
Gavi
The Vaccine Alliance announced 155 job cuts.
IOM
200 positions are being eliminated from he International Organization for Migration’s Geneva headquarters.
ILO
The International Labor Organization employs 1,255 at its Geneva headquarters. Termination letters were sent to 190 employees whose projects were suspended after the Trump cuts; 92 were reassigned to the field.
WHO
The World Health Organization is expected to lay off 40 percent of its staff in Geneva – that is, 2,600 employees, or more than 1,000 positions.
UNCTAD
The Agency for Trade and Development is planning to cut 70 positions, or 20 percent of its workforce.
A national strategy
Obviously, the city and canton want to keep the United Nations.
To that end, Geneva’s parliament has passed a resolution to safeguard UN and NGO agencies on its territory.
This move follows the vote in the cantonal parliament, approving the emergency aid of 10 million francs for NGOs.
On the federal level, the government said it is committed to helping Geneva withstand the funding crisis, earmarking 269 million francs for that purpose.
Without naming the United States specifically, the Federal Council said that “funding contribution cuts or the suspension of payments by some member states in recent months have presented key international organisations with significant challenges”.
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