Snapshot of the Humanitarian Situation in Darfur

by Michael Bear

category: Humanitarian Relief

Published May 06, 2009 @ 12:45PM PT

It's now been two months since the Sudanese government expelled or disbanded sixteen humanitarian organizations working in Darfur.  Rushing to read the tea leaves, I wasted no time in predicting an immediate humanitarian crisis.

A worst-case scenario which never quite came to pass.

That said, the situation certainly isn't pleasant - especially in certain camps.  Please see below an update on the provision of basic, life-saving assistance in Darfur two months after the expulsions:

Food and nutrition

The expulsions threatened to leave 1.1 million people without access to food aid. The World Food Program (WFP) organized a distribution to provide these people with enough food for March and April, and at the time of writing was working to arrange a further distribution to cover May and June as well.

WFP is also able to draw on local Food Relief Committees. Many of these committees were already overseeing distribution in areas where NGOs found it too difficult to operate.

However, WFP relies heavily on NGO partners, including four expelled agencies – CARE, Save the Children-US, Solidarités and Action Contre la Faim. WFP currently lacks both the staff and the infrastructure to replace these implementing partners over the long term, especially when it comes to monitoring and ensuring the accountability of distributions.

Water, sanitation and hygiene

The expelled aid agencies together helped provide clean drinking water to 1.16 million people. According to an OCHA situation report from 16 April: ‘Sanitarian and hygiene services are still lacking in most of the affected locations due to the lack of capacity and funding’. A UN assessment mission, however, warned of major water shortages if supplies of fuel and spare parts run out.

Health services

Lack of clean water means increased risk of meningitis, cholera and other water-borne diseases. Due to the expulsions, health services across Darfur have been crippled – altogether, the 13 expelled agencies provided health care to 1.5 million people. Remaining agencies are doing what they can to cover the shortfall. UNICEF has identified local health staff who used to work for expelled or disbanded agencies, and is paying them incentives for two months to keep clinics running.

As of mid-April, however, 460,000 people still lacked access to health care.

According to the World Health Organization, a number of districts – including Jebel Marra in West Darfur and Shearia in South Darfur – now have no health services at all. In Kass (South Darfur), 83% of health services have disappeared; 63% have gone in Habila (West Darfur), 22% in Kutum (North Darfur) and 20% in El Geneina (West Darfur). The expulsions has also undermined NGO efforts to provide disease surveillance.

Logistics and emergency shelter

Eleven of the 16 NGOs affected by the government’s action were UN Joint Logistic Center logistics and emergency shelter sector partners. The expulsions – and the subsequent confiscation of NGO assets – have crippled distributions of non-food items across Darfur; as of April, over 690,000 people are without Non-Food Item [NFI] distribution coverage. According to OCHA, ‘all [UNJLC NFIs] in Darfur are housed in premises that are not currently accessible to humanitarians. Despite the needs, and the availability of the items on the ground, the items cannot be distributed’.

Protection

A number of gender-based violence and child protection programs have also been forced to close. Although mandated agencies – ICRC, UNHCR and UNICEF – remain, it is doubtful that they will be able to cover the full range of protection activities offered by those agencies which were expelled or disbanded.

[The information above was taken from an article I wrote - Tough choices for agencies expelled from Darfur - which was just posted on ODI's Humanitarian Practice Network Online Exchange.]

[Food distribution at Kass camp in Darfur - from www.marcovacca.com]