15 march 2011 – 15 March 2016. Five years have passed since the war started in Syria, triggering the largest refugee crisis since the Second World War.
While 7.6 million have been displaced internally and some 3.6 million people have sought refuge in neighboring countries, including Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq, Turkey and beyond, 12 million people are today in need of life-saving aid inside the country. Syria has lost nearly four decades of human development, life expectancy has been cut by an astounding 20 years, an estimated 9.8 million people are considered food insecure, and unemployment is currently over 50%. The future of an entire generation is at stake: over 13 million children are not attending school in countries being affected - either directly or indirectly - by armed conflict in the region
With livelihood opportunities devastated by the conflict, communities are left without the ability to absorb shocks or the financial means to meet their basic needs of water and food and also fuel, which in many areas have become exorbitantly expensive in the context of the crisis. With the collapse of basic public services in the country, many infrastructures are not functioning anymore to ensure proper access to basic services to the populations and avoid further displacements.
The MENA region continues to suffer from some of the most extreme and protracted humanitarian emergencies in the world. With three of the world’s four L3 emergencies, the UN’s most severe classification, tens of millions of men, women and children have been forced to flee and are in need of urgent assistance. Millions of people have been affected by violent conflict in Yemen, Syria, Iraq, occupied Palestine and Libya and remain in desperate conditions, while countless more have fled as refugees to neighbouring countries and further afield.
A multi-country engagement
ACTED has been supporting conflict-affected communities in Syria, Jordan, Iraq and Lebanon since 2012, supporting those directly affected by the conflict, as well as supporting the communities hosting huge numbers of refugees around the region. The teams in the field have already provided emergency assistance to over 1 million displaced people settled in camps and within host communities through camp management activities, provision of basic water and sanitation services, cash distributions, the provision of food and non-food items, agricultural inputs, trainings, protection, shelter support and youth support. In addition, ACTED has been looking towards the future and to more sustainable development, supporting the rehabilitation of local infrastructure, enhancing livelihoods and building the capacity of civil society and governance to enhance the resilience of local communities.
ACTED’s action is aimed at improving vulnerable, conflict-affected communities’ ability to meet their own basic needs by restoring sustainable livelihood opportunities, improving access to inclusive and equal basic public services, and building effective governance and civil society to contribute to early recovery efforts.
Support across the region
As over 630,000 Syrian refugees have fled to Jordan, ACTED is responding to the lifesaving humanitarian needs of the refugees in the camps and host communities, especially in Za’atari and Azraq camps. In addition to water, sanitation, food, and shelter support, ACTED is working on rehabilitating infrastructures, providing social support and engaging with civil society and government actors to mitigate the increased pressure on Jordanian public institutions, especially education and health care systems.
Lebanon hosts more than a million Syrian refugees, and has demonstrated unrelenting generosity towards them. But its resilience, both economically and socially, has reached a critical point. Lebanese public services are overwhelmed and unemployment is dramatically rising. ACTED is supporting refugees and host communities to ensure basic service provision, access to water, electricity and winterization. The teams are also implementing projects to reinforce livelihoods through trainings and to strengthen humanitarian coordination.
ACTED has been working in Iraq since 2003 providing humanitarian support to vulnerable populations through multi-sector emergency assistance. ACTED currently operates in 5 bases (Dohuk, Erbil, Kalar, Kut and Sulaymaniyah), with a focus on emergency and sustainable works around water, sanitation and hygiene promotion; basic infrastructure; food security and NFI distribution; and integrated camp management. All of these interventions continue to provide basic and life-saving assistance to vulnerable populations, specifically Internally Displaced Persons, refugees and host communities.
Yet, those are only punctual remedies to a crisis with no end in sight
Until a perennial solution is found to end this conflict, ACTED is calling for all stakeholders involved to take action. Those actions should include:
- Unimpeded and sustained access for humanitarian organizations to bring immediate relief to all those in need inside Syria.
- Humanitarian pauses and unconditional, monitored ceasefires to allow food and other urgent assistance to be delivered to civilians, vaccinations and other health campaigns, and for children to return to school.
- A cessation of attacks on civilian infrastructure – so that schools, hospitals and water supplies are kept safe.
- Freedom of movement for all civilians and the immediate lifting of all sieges by all parties.
Whole of Syria: ACTED’s approach in 2016
ACTED’s approach represents a fundamental shift in the way that aid is provided in Syria. The approach moves away from household-level assistance through distributions to an area-based approach where local development is co-created by communities, local governments, and supportive institutions within key sectors, with collaboration from the private sector and civil society. While ACTED acknowledges the importance household level assistance in terms of lifesaving support, it also believes there is scope to make the link between relief, rehabilitation and development (LRRD), with a strong focus on communities as a whole, rather than just the individuals within them.
ACTED therefore seeks to complement ongoing relief efforts with an approach that encompasses the community-led rehabilitation of productive infrastructure and assets combined with capacity building of Local Councils (LCs). The engagement of LCs is crucial not only to support programme implementation, but also to continue the effective provision of services post-intervention. Through this approach, ACTED is able to promote the self-sufficiency of local communities – and the households residing within them – thereby maximizing the reach of funds.