The international NGO Danish Refugee Council together with national NGO Echelle have completed the analysis and report of the Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) profiling exercise conducted in May 2011. Read the summary of the report (598kb) (French version only) here and the full report (3,250kb) (French version only) here.

For more information, please contact:

Lukas Rüst
Protection Coordinator
Danish Refugee Council
Central African Republic
protection.car@drc.dk

Read the report from the inter-organisation mission to Sikikédé, in the Vakaga province of north-eastern CAR, which took place on Friday 25 November 2011. This was the first joint mission since September 2010. Download the report here (125kb) >>

See photos from the mission on the photos page >>

For more details, please contact:

Lauren Paletta
Information Management Officer, OCHA CAR
paletta@un.org

Christian Mulamba
Head of Mission, IMC CAR
cmulamba@internationalmedicalcorps.org

OCHA with the support of the humanitarian and development community have recently written a report on their work updating the estimations of internally displaced persons (IDPs) and returnees in the CAR. The report includes the displacement figures and map, the methodology used for data collection, the complexities of tracking displacement in the CAR, an overview of the context and causes of displacement by region and recommendations for the humanitarian community as they move forward in tracking displacement. Download the full report here (PDF, 781 KB) >>

Download the map on our Maps page, or directly here >>

For more information, please contact:

Lauren Paletta
Information Management Officer UN OCHA
Bangui, Central African Republic
paletta@un.org

L’évaluation réalisée répondait aux besoins exprimés à la fois par le Programme, le Reporting et la Coordination afin d’établir un bilan des activités menées et identifier une situation de base en début de période de soudure. Cette enquête s’inscrit aussi dans un processus d’apprentissage continu.
L’équipe AME (Appraisal, Monitoring and Evaluation) d’ACTED, coordonnée par la Manager Reporting & AME ACTED RCA, a mené une évaluation du 13 juin au 28 juin 2011 dans les sous-préfectures de Zémio et Mboki dans l’Ouest du Haut Mbomou et du 29 juin au 01 juillet 2011 dans la sous-préfecture de Djémah, visant à évaluer les niveaux de vulnérabilités sur la zone, les enjeux liés à l’accueil des déplacés et réfugiés sur la zone, les conséquences de la dégradation sécuritaire progressive sur les dynamiques de relèvement et les besoins persistants.

Read more by downloading the evaluation report (1,129KB) (french version only) >>
You may be also interested to read the Multi-Sector Rapid Evaluation in Djémah, and view the presentation given to the HDPT community.

For more information, please contact:

Julien Benoist
Country Director
ACTED CAR
julien.benoist@acted.org

Highlights

• La CNR forme la police sur la loi d’asile en RCA
• L’AFJC s’attaque aux violences liées aux accusations de sorcellerie
• L’UNHCR renforce les capacités des réfugiés du camp de Batalimo

Read more by downloading the bulletin (1.9 MB) >>

For further details please contact:

UNHCR office in CAR
Mr. Djerassem Mbaiorem
Email: mbaiorem@unhcr.org | Phone: +236 21 61 32 80

The ACTED team recently gave a presentation to the HDPT community on their multi-sector evaluation of Djémah, in the Haut-Mbomou préfecture of south-eastern CAR. The evaluation covers security, logistics, nutrition, food security, agriculture, water and sanitation, health, economic development, education, protection and advocacy. Download the presentation given to the HDPT community here >>

For more information, please contact:

Perrine Laissus
Reporting Manager
ACTED Central African Republic
perrine.laissus@acted.org

Highlights

• Cross-border meeting in Bangui between UNHCR Offices in Chad, Cameroon and CAR.
• Spontaneous return of CAR refugees from neighboring countries
• Final exams in secondary school for Congolese refugees in CAR
• Celebration of the World Refugee Day in Bangui and Field Offices

Read more by downloading the bulletin (1MB) >>

For further details please contact:

UNHCR office in CAR
Mr. Djerassem Mbaiorem
Email: mbaiorem@unhcr.org | Phone: +236 21 61 32 80

Microfinance is recognized for its potential transformative effect on poverty. By providing financial services (primarily savings and credit) to poor and low income populations, microfinance empowers them to develop and to implement their own solutions to local challenges. The activities in 2010 are the result of the implementation of the 2010 annual work plan adopted by the Steering Committee in November 2009.

These activities have covered such portfolio monitoring and technical support to partners; support to consultant’s missions for training and formalization of EMF; strengthening national capacity for training, advocacy, representation, supervision and control of the sector; putting in place the national strategy of inclusive finance; organization study tours and exchange of experiences in West Africa and the mobilization of resources.

The African Development Bank as part of its future support to the country has committee US$5 million to the government for the financial services offer to the Central African population.

Over 30,000 people, 4% of household in the CAR and of whom 45% are women, have access to financial services, offering favorable economic opportunities to the improvement of income. Micro finance institutions provide various financial services and facilitate income generating activities.

Read more in the February bulletin >>

For further details please contact:
UNDP Communications Unit
Central African Republic
+236 75 50 55 45

Between November 3 and 25 2010, two COOPI teams conducted an evaluation of the humanitarian situation in two sub-prefectures of the Haut-Mbomou prefecture, Obo and Bambouti, with a focus on the Mboki, Obo and Bambouti axis. The final report includes information on the security situation, the humanitarian actors and locations of intervention, the results of the evaluation in the sectors of education, protection, food security and livelihoods, health and water and sanitation and the questionnaire used for the evaluation.

Download the evaluation report here (PDF | 2,287KB) >>

For further details please contact:

Sabine Jiekak
COOPI CAR
Email: jiekak@coopi.org

Highlights

• The second round of the parliamentarian election scheduled for 27 March 2010
• Opposition plan to boycott the second round of election
• Chadian troops left Birao on 14 February 2011

Working with partners

Implementing partners include the Government’s Commission Nationale pour les Réfugiés (CNR), CNPPDI and other relevant ministries, IRC, DRC, Triangle GH, IMC, Merlin, COOPI, CSSI and CARITAS. UNHCR chairs the Protection Cluster and works closely with the UN Country Team, national and international NGOs and donors, and participates in joint activities, like the provision of protection and assistance to IDPs in the North.

Achievements

• The Office has started interviewing refugee returnees in Ouham Pendé prefecture. As to date, 46 out of 93 refugee returnee families have been interviewed in Nana-Barya. Findings show that all returnees in Nana-Barya fled to Cameroon. Those who returned came back either due to a family death, for health reasons, or due to difficult living conditions in Cameroon. Generally, it appears that before fleeing to asylum, 82% of interviewees lived in brick houses, after displacement 82% live in straw houses. There is no access to potable water, only 50% of children are educated, 95% have access to healthcare, and 80% of returnees eat only 1 meal per day. Only 37% feel that they are secure in Nana-Barya, and 82% have no knowledge or access to the judicial system. 21% of the refugee families interviewed have a family member who is handicapped or blind, and 18% of interviewees were single women with children.
• UNHCR and the humanitarian community in Paoua have started discussion on the return of IDPs in their villages of origin. This comes after a meeting APRD, one rebel group acting in the north, had a meeting with 46 chiefs of villages to discuss the return of IDPs to their villages.
• 180 hectares of farm lands are being distributed to Sudanese refugees by local authorities in Bambari to help them start agricultural activities. They have already received agricultural materials and seeds from FAO.

Read more by downloading the full bulletin >>

For further details please contact:

UNHCR office in CAR
Mr. Djerassem Mbaiorem
Email: mbaiorem@unhcr.org | Phone: +236 21 61 32 80

The MENTOR Initiative (MENTOR) has been operational in Central African Republic (CAR) since February 2008 with emergency programmes in the north-western prefectures of Ouham and Ouham Pende. Recent armed conflict and banditry have caused a number of people to flee into the neighbouring countries of Chad and Cameroon, whilst others have been internally displaced. Limited shelter increased exposure to malarial vectors, exacerbating the risk of contracting malaria. Since 2008, an estimated 200,000 people, from both displaced and host populations, have benefited from MENTOR programmes that focus on reducing the risk of malaria in pregnant women and children less than 5 years of age.

In order to assess the impact of the interventions among the beneficiaries, particularly in the fields of health seeking behaviour and bed net use, a Knowledge-Attitude-Practice (KAP) survey was conducted in April 2010.

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Highlight

Announcement of final results of presidential election. The Constitutional Court validated the presidential election of last January and declared President Francois Bozize as the winner with 64,37%. In addition, the Court declared unfounded the queries from opposition candidates who called for the cancellation of these elections due to fraud, according to their own statement.

The two international staff from MSF who were kidnapped by rebels on January 30, 2011, have been released last week (February 20, 2011).

Working with partners

Implementing partners include the Government’s Commission Nationale pour les Réfugiés (CNR), CNPPDI and other relevant ministries, IRC, DRC, Triangle GH, IMC, Merlin, COOPI, CSSI and CARITAS. UNHCR chairs the Protection Cluster and works closely with the UN Country Team, national and international NGOs and donors, and participates in joint activities, like the provision of protection and assistance to IDPs in the North.

Achievements

• Protection meetings in Bangui last week reached following results: Gender Based Violence sub cluster met (February 8, 2011) with all relevant partners and adopted a common mechanism for monthly data collection, revised its ToR and proposed a chart that will contain all interventions, highlighting the gaps and avoid duplications. In addition, all partners involved in protection issues held a meeting (February 11, 2011) to boost the protection cluster. DRC has been appointed as co-lead of the cluster.
• Implementation of pilot documentation project aiming at delivering birth certificate and/or national identity cards to IDPs in Kaga Bandoro and Paoua to avoid statelessness and offer educational perspectives to young people. To date, 2000 birth certificates were distributed to people from Fah and Bamatara villages. The second step which includes delivering of identity cards is on the way.

Read more by downloading the full bulletin >>

For further details please contact:

UNHCR office in CAR
Mr. Djerassem Mbaiorem
Email: mbaiorem@unhcr.org | Phone: +236 21 61 32 80

Four key indicators illustrating the extent of the Central African Republic’s development catastrophe:

• CAR ranks 178 out of 179 on the UN’s Human Development Index 2008, down from 171 the year before
• CAR ranks 180 out of 181 on the World Bank’s Doing Business Index, unchanged from last year
• CAR ranks 8 out off 177 on the Fragile State Index of the Fund for Peace, down from 10 last year
• Bangui ranks 214 out of 215 on Mercer’s Quality of Living Index, one before Baghdad

(KJ*) Over the last two years, humanitarian assistance has made a decisive contribution to the stabilization the Central African Republic while the country’s condition was at its most critical. Back from the brink of collapse, the benefits of peace and stability now would have to be spread much wider throughout this desperately poor country, if the patient were to recover successfully. However, while humanitarian assistance is levelling off and may well decrease in 2009, development support is still lacking too far behind to pick up the thread. The looming recovery gap now jeopardizes CAR’s fragile progress, as data from the country’s new aid management system shows.

Improving aid effectiveness

In November 2008, the Central African Republic (CAR) and its partners launched a new aid management system (DAD). Widely used in Asia but still rare in Africa, the goal of this online database is to make humanitarian and development aid more transparent, coordinated and effective. Previously, no central data source existed to help decision-makers understand who finances projects, who works in which sectors, in which locations, and where the gaps are. As in many other African states critically dependent on foreign support, the absence of reliable data was a stumbling block to improved aid effectiveness. Less than four months after the system’s launch, detailed financial, sector and geographical data for almost 300 projects is now available online. While the usual caveats on aid statistics apply (the data will not account for 100 percent of all transfers), the numbers are nevertheless already a reasonably good reflection of the realities in CAR.

Good numbers on the surface

At first sight, the recent data on aid to the Central African Republic looks encouraging. Between 2005 and 2007, total foreign assistance to CAR more than doubled from about $117m to $242m. The increase is particularly significant, given that CAR had long been a forgotten crisis. While aid to Sub-Saharan Africa as a whole went up by more than 90 percent between 1985 and 2006, it fell by almost 50 percent for CAR. During this time, the country’s development catastrophe slowly turned into a humanitarian emergency, directly affecting more than a million people and forcing up to 300,000 into displacement. CAR now ranks 178 out of 179 on the UN’s Human Development Index. More than two thirds of the population live in poverty. Reaching the Millennium Development Goals has become a distant dream. Continue Reading »

An updated presentation of the general humanitarian and development situation in CAR is now available. UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator Toby Lanzer presented this briefing to donors and other partners in Europe earlier this month, including at an OECD/DAC seminar, during EC consultations in Brussels and with Dutch officials in the Hague. The updated version integrates new developments in security sector reform and political dialogue, as well as other key points.

Download presentation
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