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Residents of IFO camp in Dadaab, where roughly 90 percent of the 54,000 mostly Somali refugees have been uprooted, flee the rising waters. UNHCR has been hiring donkey carts to take residents to Hagadera camp, one of the other two camps in Dadaab. Most of the vulnerable were transferred in Red Cross trucks. [Photo: UNHCR/Bannon] |
Since early 2006, Kenya has suffered a devastating drought, destructive floods, deadly disease outbreaks and at the same time has given asylum to more than 22,000 new refugees. Humanitarian response capacities would have been stretched to address any one of these disasters by itself. The emergencies occured in swift succession, often affecting the same people so that the impact of the emergencies was compounded.
The challenge for humanitarian agencies, UN and NGO alike, has been enormous since the main affected areas have been remote and difficult to access while local health and emergency services lacked the capacity to address the needs. The CERF funds made it possible to respond swiftly and support life-saving activities to the more than 3 million persons affected by one or more of the shocks in a coordinated and coherent manner. The impact on the beneficiaries has been more focused and better targeted as a result.
Kenya is currently facing a serious humanitarian crisis following the failure of the cycles of rain, particularly the October to December short rains of 2005. Some 3.5 million people are affected by the drought and require humanitarian assistance. Food security in the predominantly pastoralist areas of the country remains precarious as a result of massive livestock losses – amounting to 70 per cent in some of the north-eastern districts. As a consequence, a high number of pastoralists moved to settlements closer to an urban area, thus increasing significantly household vulnerability and dependence on food aid.
As of 12 October, the CERF had committed USD 12.9 million for emergency life-saving projects in Kenya. Of this, two allocations were made from the CERF’s window for “rapid response”. The first, totaling USD 8.4 million, came in March for timely response to the drought in the Horn of Africa. A second allocation of USD 1 million was made for Kenya in May from the CERF’s capacity for “under-funded emergencies” to address financing shortfalls for refugee programmes. A third allocation of USD 3.5 million came in September to enable UN agencies and their partners to quickly meet the needs of the newly-arrived Somali refugees, who fled to Kenya following the upsurge in violence inside Somalia.
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Flooding in IFO camp, Dadaab. Food distribution at the camp. Severe flooding limits where food distributions can take place. Here refugees struggle to maintain their alane and to keep their food dry. [Photo: UNHCR] |
Airdrops of UNHCR relief items for refugees in Dadaab camps. UNHCR Emergency Supply Officer, Maurice Bisau, helps load airdropped items onto Red Cross trucks. [Photo: UNHCR/Bannon] |
Rapid response for drought
In March, the Emergency Relief Coordinator announced that USD 25 million in CERF funds would be made available for the drought in the Horn of Africa, including USD 8.4 million for Kenya. The projects proved instrumental in strengthening the emergency response to the 3.5 million drought affected civilians in Kenya. Because funds were available almost at the onset of the drought, the UN and its partners were able to respond immediately to the crisis by introducing life saving and livelihood supporting programmes. The life-saving interventions were focused on the supply of food, increased accessibility to medical services and the provision of water for both domestic and livestock use.
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Children standing near a dry water pan in Turkana District
[Photo: George Mulala, UNICEF Kenya] |
WFP Emergency Food Assistance
WFP received a CERF grant of USD 3.8 million to increase the ration of fortified supplementary food from 40 g per person per day in May to 80 g per person per day in June 2006. This fortified food supported the diets of 1.4 million beneficiaries in the 9 pastoral districts most affected by the drought.
UNICEF - Water and Sanitation
Equally important were more specialized interventions in health and nutrition. Increased reproductive and primary health care has been critical in the drought affected areas since there have been very high rates of child, infant and maternal malnutrition. CERF funds also went to UNICEF (USD 2.17 million) and WHO (USD 730,000) to implement emergency immunization programmes in districts where the coverage rates were well below the national average. Moreover, UNICEF set up therapeutic feeding centers in areas with the highest malnutrition rates. CERF funds were used to address the special nutrition needs of 7,000 lactating mothers and 82,000 severely malnourished children. 356,715 children and 109,566 pregnant and lactating women benefited from a minimum health package. UNFPA responded to the protection needs of women and girls by creating programmes addressing problems related to sexual and gender based violence.
Part of the CERF allocation to the health sector was used for measles vaccinations that were carried out from April to June. CERF funds helped to curtail the outbreak at an early stage. Furthermore, complementary activities in disease surveillance and support to health structures meant that this campaign was able to reach a higher percentage of the affected population than before.
With the support of the Government of Kenya and humanitarian agencies, UNICEF played a crucial role in improving water and sanitation access within pastoral districts. The UN agency rehabilitated many water facilities, provided fuel for water pumping, installed 250 water tanks in schools and 150 in communities, and supplied chlorine for water.
FAO’s interventions supported the pastoralist communities in northern Kenya whose livelihoods had been devastated by colossal livestock losses due to acute water and pasture shortages and concomitant animal disease outbreaks. FAO also re-distributed livestock and invested in de-worming.
Grant for under-funded refugee programmes
Kenya received another USD 1 million from the CERF in May for its under-funded refugee programmes. These funds, channeled through WFP and UNHCR, were used to care for the 240,000 refugees at Kakuma and Dadaab camps, who mostly fled from Somalia, Sudan, and Ethiopia. Lack of funding worsened living conditions of refugees in camps. The situation was further compounded by an influx of new asylum-seekers from South Somalia and Sudan in 2006. Following a participatory community-based needs assessment, WFP and UNHCR decided to focus their CERF-funded interventions on core life-saving activities, protection, and livelihoods empowerment.
UNHCR – Shelter, Non-Food Items, and Protection
With USD 500,000 provided by CERF, UNHCR was able to provide firewood to all refugees including new arrivals. Thus, refugees, which were often subject to rapes and other forms of violence, did not have to go out in search of firewood. Refugees were also provided with energy saving cooking stoves. Additional training was provided on how to fabricate mud stoves in their homes. Firewood distribution was extended to other institutions such as schools and hospitals; it enabled, for instance, schools to ensure regular attendance. The hospitals in both camps and the vocational and teacher training colleges in Kakuma were also supplied with firewood.
CERF funds also complemented the supply of soap, although its monthly ration is still at only 50 per cent of the required standard. The water distribution system was maintained, and in spite of the new arrivals no water shortage was reported in Dadaab and Kakuma. In Dadaab the refugees received an average of 15 to 20 liters per person per day, while Kakuma provided an average of 17.4 liters per person per day. Construction of additional latrines led to further improvements in the sanitation sector, while rehabilitation and repair of existing latrines continued.
A sizeable number of shelters were destroyed due to floods that affected the refugee camps in Kakuma. Tents were provided and communal shelters and latrines were built. Affected refugees received building materials to reconstruct their homes. New sites were also identified.
Rapid response for the influx of Somali refugees
The United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator (HC) in Kenya requested rapid assistance from the CERF in September to cope with the steady influx of Somali refugees into Kenya following the stand-off between the Transitional Federal Government and the Islamic Courts Union. Warning that the number of Somali refugees could increase to 50,000 by the end of the year, the HC asked for urgent funding to cover food, health, and integrated refugee services for the incoming populations.
WFP Emergency Food Assistance
Within the framework of the Somali refugee response programme, WFP requested USD 1,738,000 to purchase food for its bi-monthly general food distribution and special feeding programmes. UNICEF has also requested for USD 278,000 from CERF funds to ensure that additional potable water supplies are available for the rapidly expanding refugee camp population. Water containers, expanded sanitation and borehole maintenance are also needed for the new arrivals.
UNHCR – Shelter, Non-Food Items, and Protection
UNHCR requested a sum of USD 1,484,000 for the refugee programme to increase immediate service delivery to the new refugees in all sectors: food, logistics, health and water/sanitation provision, shelter, protection.
UNHCR will also use their CERF grant to provide food, plastic sheeting, blankets, kitchen sets, jerry cans, sleeping mats, and firewood to the refugees. They will also provide water and latrines to additional areas of the camp where new arrivals will be accommodated.
CERF funds will also fund the construction of an additonal 6,000 temporary shelters are to accommodate 30,000 of the 50,000 new arrivals. UNHCR generally distributes materials to the majority of refugees, who build their own traditional shelters. However, UNHCR will build 200 housing units for people with special needs who are not able to build their own accommodation. In addition, the current refugee transit centres will be repaired and expanded to host the refugees before they are allocated land and materials for shelter construction.
CERF fund will also enable the provision of health services to refugees. Specifically, UNHCR is also hiring additional health staff and procuring drugs and one ambulance. School children will benefit from the construction of 15 classrooms and 50 school latrines. To further the children’s education, an additional 45 teachers will be hired. The CERF is also funding provision of text books and desks.
Another critical intervention is an expanded vaccination programme for measles and polio. Kenya is polio-free, but there have already been over 30 diagnosed cases of polio in Somalia this year.
[Last update: 16 October 2006]
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