(Corrects paragraph 7 to show that USAID restored existing contracts in March. Adds statements from MANA and State Department, paragraphs 8-11)
By Rich McKay
FITZGERALD, Georgia (Reuters) -Reaching into one of the giant white sacks piled up in his Georgia food-processing plant, Mark Moore pulls out a fistful of shelled peanuts - what he calls "God's food" - and lets them roll through his fingers.
A former evangelical missionary, Moore is co-founder of MANA Nutrition, a non-profit that says it has fed 10 million children across the globe since 2010 with packets of peanut butter paste made in the small farming community of Fitzgerald, about 180 miles south of Atlanta.
"This saves children," said Moore, 58, clutching a bunch of the protein-rich legumes. "It's not an overstatement: We defeat death."
But MANA is now in the midst of its own struggle for survival. Deep cuts in federal programs targeting international aid programs under President Donald Trump have threatened to choke off the financial lifeline that has allowed the non-profit to carry out its life-saving mission.
Since January, the U.S. Agency for International Development - created during the height of the Cold War by then-President John F. Kennedy - has all been but dismantled by the Department of Government Efficiency, Trump's cost-cutting entity led until recently by billionaire Elon Musk.
USAID in February said it was terminating MANA's existing contracts, which accounted for about 90 percent of MANA's $100 million annual budget. DOGE sent a letter to the non-profit saying its work was "not aligned with Agency priorities."
But soon afterwards, USAID reversed course and restored those contracts. The State Department now says it and USAID are actively working with MANA and Rhode Island's Edesia Nutrition, which makes a similar product, to renew their government contracts, and that they are committed to working with their partners in delivering therapeutic food.
Without elaborating, a senior State Department official said in an email that an additional $50 million, or 1.4 million boxes of the paste, was approved from the two companies as recently as May 26.
Still, no new government contracts have been awarded to MANA in 2025, spokesperson Jon McDowell said in an email.
But he said the situation was "highly dynamic" and that MANA was committed to working with State and USAID going forward.
According to MANA, USAID has only one open request for bids on a contract. Under historical prices, the nonprofit said, such a contract would be worth roughly $17 million to either MANA or Edesia, or divided between providers.
If MANA fails to pick up any new contracts, the nonprofit would have just enough cash on hand to keep running through August at the most, Moore says.
Even so, he seems unshakable in his optimism about the future of its mission, even as the Trump administration has slashed 90 percent of all USAID contracts and $60 billion in U.S. assistance across the board.
He has vowed to keep his 80,000 square-foot factory going and his 130 workers employed.
One possibility is finding another international aid organization to support the manufacture and distribution of MANA's peanut paste packets, each about the size of a cell phone. Most of the product - which also includes powdered milk, sugar and vitamins - goes to Africa, where Moore served as a missionary in Uganda for 10 years.
"It saves children who are at the brink of no return," said Mark Manary, an expert in childhood nutrition at Washington University's Institute for Public Health who helped develop the paste's formula. "It's hard to wrap your mind around the need."
Manary said the food created in Georgia and at Edesia's operation is an important link in the global effort to stave off starvation of children in countries where the No. 1 killer is malnutrition.
Moore hopes lawmakers and the Trump administration will keep seeing the value in the work and put the money back into the new federal budget.
"I believe that the U.S. government will remain involved in global food aid," he said, adding that he has spoken to both Republicans and Democrats who want the work to continue.
Moore is also seeking contracts with other organizations that specialize in humanitarian aid for children in crisis, including Save the Children, International Rescue Committee and UNICEF. The organizations did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
One bright spot in recent years was an infusion of cash from Chris Hohn, a hedge-fund billionaire based in London and a philanthropist with the Children's Investment Fund Foundation. Hohn's charity did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In recent years, Hohn has given more than $250 million to MANA Nutrition, according to Moore, much of it already spent on expanding the plant, more than doubling its space and adding new machinery.
But MANA needs new contracts to go forward, or another donation from philanthropists.
"We've been put on Earth for a purpose," he said. "Jesus told his disciples to go and feed the people. So, we've been hustling nonstop."
(Reporting by Rich McKay in Fitzgerald, Georgia; Editing by Frank McGurty)
