Oxfam is there

Despite the daily dangers, Oxfam staff are currently providing vital assistance to around 500,000 people affected by the crisis, both in Darfur and eastern Chad. We provide essential access to clean, safe water and sanitation, as well as basic necessities such as blankets, soap and jerry cans for carrying water. We carry out public health education programs to try and prevent the spread of disease; and, as the crisis continues with no sign of abating, we are implementing projects to provide livelihood opportunities to help people find some alternative to the reliance on external aid.

The current situation

The numbers are staggering

It is more than five years since the start of the Darfur crisis. Today the situation is as desperate as ever. The sheer scale of suffering is incredible, and the numbers of people affected are higher than ever before:

• Over 4.5 million people in Darfur and eastern Chad now rely on humanitarian aid
• 2.5 million people  - more than one in three Darfurians – have been forced from their homes by the violence
• Over 2 million of them are now sheltering in camps for Internally Displaced People (IDPs) inside Darfur
• A further quarter of a million refugees from Darfur are in camps over the border in neighbouring Chad
• In 2007 alone, a further 300,00 people fled their homes across Darfur
• Another 185,000 Chadian people have fled their homes as the conflict increasingly spills over into Chad. The number of Chadians displaced by violence has quadrupled in the past year

Humanitarian response under threat

 Darfur is the world’s largest international humanitarian response. Yet aid agencies’ vital work is being severely threatened by the ongoing violence against civilians and increasingly violent, targeted attacks on humanitarian workers, with all the many parties to the conflict bearing responsibility for this violence.

Incidents against aid workers and operations are now occurring on a daily basis. Humanitarian vehicles are regularly hijacked and stolen; staff are frequently assaulted, intimidated, abducted, robbed and shot at; and humanitarian compounds and offices are broken into by armed robbers. 13 aid workers, including an Oxfam staff member, have been killed in the last 12 months – more than in the rest of the conflict combined.

Massive disruption

The violence has seriously disrupted Oxfam’s programs. In June we announced the permanent withdrawal of programs in Gereida – Darfur’s largest camp where 130,000 people have taken refuge. Many activities in the town had been suspended for the previous six months since a particularly violent attack on the compounds of aid organisations including Oxfam. The local authorities’ failure to do anything to improve the safety of our staff left us with no option but to withdraw.

Despite the deterioration in security, Oxfam is still helping around 500,000 people affected by the crisis, and our staff remain fully committed to assisting the people of Darfur.  

Rising humanitarian need

While aid workers are being attacked, the people suffering most of all are the civilians of Darfur, who live in fear as the violence continues all around them. People are still fleeing their homes. Since the start of 2007 at least 140,000 more people have fled – some of them for the second or third time as the violence has followed them.

Many camps – particularly those near the major towns – are now at capacity and overstretched, yet people continue to arrive in search of help.

The violence against humanitarians means that more than half a million people are currently going without the assistance they need – because aid agencies cannot access them. Large parts of rural Darfur are now completely inaccessible. With many roads unsafe to use due to the risk of hijacking, the majority of programmes are now accessed by helicopter. However, helicopter services only go to the larger towns and camps.

The massive humanitarian response has had considerable success in managing to stabilise living conditions in the camps, cutting rates of mortality and malnutrition. But as humanitarian access rapidly decreases there is a danger this could be reversed. There are increasing fears that we could see a return to the devastating levels of malnutrition and disease that were seen at the start of the crisis.  

 A ceasefire needed now

With ongoing attacks on civilians, increased targeting of aid workers, and decreasing humanitarian access, the people of Darfur do not have time to wait for change. Oxfam is calling on all the many parties to the conflict to agree, and adhere to, an immediate ceasefire. The international community should pressure the parties to respect international humanitarian law, stop targeting civilians and humanitarians, and create a safe environment for aid operations. 

Life in the camps

Most people arrive in the camps with virtually nothing. Some were able to bring animals and a few pots or blankets (if they were not killed or stolen in attacks), but many came with just the clothes they were wearing. Even for those lucky enough to bring animals such as donkeys and cows it is difficult to find food with which to feed them, and taking them out to graze puts the owners at serious risk of attack.

In many camps, the makeshift huts in which many of the families shelter are made of little more than sticks and plastic sheeting. However, some camps, such as Abu Shouk on the outskirts of El Fasher, have taken on an air of permanence, with stone buildings replacing the tents. With the conflict showing no sign of ending, many people expect to be stuck in the camps for a long time to come. 

What is Oxfam doing?

Despite the daily dangers and the sheer scale of the crisis, Oxfam is helping around 500,000 people in Darfur and Chad, working with communities to save lives. Our programs are designed not only to keep people healthy and reduce disease, but also to help people maintain their basic human dignity. We:

• Provide vital clean, safe water pumped from natural sources
• Improve sanitation to help fight the spread of disease – by building latrines and washing facilities, and distributing essential items such as soap, and buckets and jerry cans for carrying water
• Distribute essential items such as plastic sheeting, materials for shelters, and blankets for the cold nights.
• Work in close coordination with local people to ensure that our work meets the real needs and priorities of Darfur, involving communities at every step of the decision-making process. In particular, we work with women's groups and other marginalised sectors of society to ensure that everyone benefits from our programmes.
• Train hundreds of community volunteers to educate others about sanitation and personal hygiene, and recruit attendants from within the camp’s communities to keep toilets and washing facilities clean, and to make sure water sources are protected.
• Work with children – using entertaining plays, music and school activities to pass on hygiene education messages and influence behaviour at a vital early age.
• Provide training and expertise to improve livelihoods opportunities and reduce people’s dependency on aid.

Rebuilding livelihoods

Traditional livelihoods of agriculture and trade have been largely destroyed by the current conflict. Effectively trapped in camps, people cannot access their fields and markets without risk of being attacked. Women going out to collect firewood are frequently harassed, assaulted and abducted.

Oxfam is working to provide people with skills and opportunities to gain an income and reduce the dependency on external aid. For example, by training plumbers, welders, vets and carpenters; and by distributing seeds, tools and ploughs in areas where they can be used. We have also distributed donkeys and animals.

Latest facts and figures

How many are we helping? Around 500,000 people are currently benefiting directly from Oxfam’s response to the Darfur humanitarian crisis – nearly 400,000 people in Darfur and 95,000 people in Chad.

How many staff do we have? To run programmes assisting so many people requires a large team. Oxfam currently has around 250 Sudanese staff and 25 expatriate staff working in Darfur, plus many more volunteers from within the IDP camps themselves and half a dozen expatriate support staff based in Khartoum. In Chad we have another 22 expatriate staff and nearly 90 local Chadian employees.  

What do they do?

They include engineers, public health promoters, accountants, logisticians, project managers, protection advisers, well drillers, HR advisers, food security analysts, livelihoods experts, administrators, and the support staff needed to keep a programme of this size running.