Rebel excersizing in a training camp in north-eastern CAR.
Now that years of conflict in the Central African Republic are starting to wind down, opportunities for economic recovery have begun to open up in many parts of the north. There are still many challenges; principle among them road banditry which places a heavy burden on trade and local economies. However, in spite all of this hardship, the people in the north have shown remarkable resilience.
In Paoua, for example, large proportions of the local and displaced populations are now working within cooperatives, women’s groups or other associations. Also, since late 2007, people in many parts of the country have begun returning to their villages and rebuilding their houses and livelihoods, particularly in Birao, around Kabo, and between Ouandago and Kaga-Bandoro.
With this accelerating return home, aid organisations are helping to create economic opportunities for communities that have been roiled by violence. To that end, micro-credit programs and support to small farm cooperatives are now available in eleven places across the country. Additionally, 48 kilometres of dirt roads have been rehabilitated so far this year and there are plans to work on an additional 282 kilometres.
Since restarting economic activity will be key to sustaining the Central African Republic’s fragile progress, many aid organisations have planned to focus their activities on the local economy for the rest of the year. Programmes supporting farmers, herdsmen and fisherman will help strengthen the link between humanitarian and development assistance as well.
In Paoua, women communities receive help from the
Danish Refugee Council to set up small businesses.
Most recently, humanitarian organisations were called upon to assist people ravaged by the Ugandan Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) near Obo on the border with the Democratic Republic of the Congo. They acted quickly to provide protection, basic health and education services to a weakend population. As in the north, these emergency activities will soon be linked with early recovery projects (in road rehabilitation, for example), so that the population can start re-building better lives.
Get more details in the 2008 Coordinated Aid Programme Mid-Year Review (PDF - 2.8 MB).
When families are forced to flee their villages because of violence, they often have to leave behind some of their most valuable assets: seeds and tools for farming. This leads to an even bigger loss: their harvest. 
Non-governmental Organisations (NGOs) and United Nations agencies together have ranked all projects in the emergency appeal for the Central African Republic (CAR), which is a part of the Consolidated Appeals Process (CAP) for 2008.
