Country: Nepal Source: World Food Programme Please refer to the attached file. EXECUTIVE FINDINGS The August 2026 floods caused widespread displacement and damage to homes, food stocks, agricultural land, livestock, businesses, roads, bridges and markets across Rasuwa, Nuwakot and Dhading. WFP conducted this rapid assessment between 5 and 16 September to understand how affected households were accessing food after the initial relief phase, identify households at risk as emergency support changes, and inform a transition that protects consumption while recovery remains incomplete. The Illusion of Food Security The assessment presents an apparently positive but highly conditional food-security picture that masks significant underlying vulnerability. At the time of interview, 91. 6 percent of surveyed households had acceptable food consumption and 77. 9 percent had a low food-related coping score. On the surface, these findings suggest that most affected households were food secure. However, the sources of food reveal a different reality. Emergency assistance was the main source of cereals for 91. 9 percent of households, pulses for 91. 5 percent and cooking oil for 89. 3 percent. Overall, 90. 9 percent depended on assistance for all three core staples. Even among households with acceptable food consumption, 88. 3 percent relied on assistance for these foods. The assessment therefore identifies an illusion of food security. Households were consuming adequate food at the time of the survey, but that consumption remained heavily dependent on humanitarian assistance. The positive food-security indicators demonstrate that emergency assistance was working. They do not indicate that affected households had recovered the independent capacity to produce or purchase sufficient food. Beneath the positive consumption results, displacement remained widespread, productive assets and food stocks had been lost, dietary diversity remained weak, and access to markets was still constrained. A premature reduction in assistance could quickly expose these underlying vulnerabilities, causing acceptable food consumption to deteriorate as households exhaust the assistance currently sustaining it.
Nepal: The Illusion of Food Security: Food Security Protected by Emergency Assistance: WFP’s Household Survey in Flood Affected Areas of Rasuwa, Nuwakot and Dhading – September 2026
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