Visa squeeze forces UK university with thousands of African students into $53 million cut

The University of Sunderland is seeking to cut £40 million ($53 million) from its annual budget as tighter UK visa rules and rising refusals reduce the number of international students it can recruit, raising concerns for thousands of African students who make up a significant part of its overseas population, Business Insider Africa reports.

The university currently has 29,414 students, including 8,368 international students in the UK and a further 9,743 based overseas.

Its 2025/26 enrolment figures show nearly 4,000 African students, led by 2,559 Nigerians, 438 Ghanaians, 291 Botswanans and 139 Kenyans, with Zimbabwe, Egypt, South Africa, Morocco, Zambia and Uganda also represented.

The squeeze follows a March 2026 UK visa brake requiring Student visa applications made outside the country by nationals of Cameroon, Sudan, Afghanistan and Myanmar to be refused, a measure the Home Office says will prevent about 4,300 visas from being issued, including roughly 200 for Cameroonians and 160 for Sudanese applicants.

Sunderland has already withdrawn 69 offers to Myanmar applicants amid a broader rise in visa refusals.In an email to staff reported by the BBC, chief financial officer Ben Dale said the university must operate on a budget £40 million lower by September 2027, with cuts to both staff and non-staff costs required to be “recurrent and permanent.”

He said Sunderland was focused on structuring for its future student population size.International students account for 42.7% of Sunderland’s UK-based enrolments and 51.8% of its postgraduate population, underscoring the scale of the financial exposure the cuts are meant to address.