Facts
A total of
87,977
people in need received our assistance in 2018.
Humanitarian overview
The Boko Haram attacks since 2014 in the Lake Chad Basin region, have continued to wreak havoc, forcing massive displacements in Cameroon’s Far North region. In March 2019, 100,000 Nigerian refugees, 245,000 internally displaced people and 105,000 returnees live here.
These attacks have led to acute needs. Limited resources make it difficult to meet the needs of the growing number of displaced people in the region, where 1.9 million people are in need of assistance. Many people have lost their civil documentation. Nearly 36 per cent of school-aged children do not possess birth certificates, limiting their chances of completing their education.
In the English speaking South West and North West regions of Cameroon, a new crisis started in 2016. It escalated in October 2017, leading to the internal displacement of 530,000 people and around 35,000 Cameroonian refugees in Nigeria.
In the East and North regions, 252,000 Central African Refugees call Cameroon home. Having arrived in 2014/2015, over 70 per cent of these refugees live in host communities.
People we helped in Cameroon in 2018
NRC’s operation
In response to the needs of people fleeing their homes in the Lake Chad Basin area, we opened a country office in April of 2017. Since then, we have responded to the urgent needs of the most vulnerable, displaced people in the Far North region. We opened an office in the South West Region in June 2018, a sub-office in the North West Region in March 2019, and we are providing emergency assistance to the internally displaced populations in both regions.
Education
We support local authorities in improving children’s access to quality education. Our teams:
- train primary school teachers in psychosocial support
- rehabilitate and equip classrooms destroyed during the conflict
- distribute learning materials to teachers and school kits to children
Information, counselling and legal assistance (ICLA)
We identify challenges related to civil documentation and provide free information, counselling and legal assistance to displaced and returnee populations. Our teams:
- visit communities to register cases and counsel displaced people who lack identity documents and birth certificates
- organise group information sessions
- support displaced people who encounter administrative hurdles in accessing civil documentation
- support registrar’s offices with birth certificate registers to facilitate the transcription of birth certificate records
- train local entities involved in child birth registration
- lead a working group on civil documentation, coordinating with actors to ensure collective advocacy and harmonisation of costs, tools and procedures.
We also identify challenges related to access to Land, Housing and Property (HLP) rights for affected populations. Our teams:
- visit communities to register HLP related cases and counsel displaced people on their HLP rights
- train the humanitarian NGOs on HLP rights as cross-cutting issues
- train the local authorities on HLP rights and Collaborative Dispute Resolution
- lead a working group on HLP, coordinating with actors to ensure that HLP is integrated as cross-cutting, but also provide technical support to the humanitarian community
- we also conducted a study on Housing, land and property (HLP) in the Far North region
Shelter and settlements
The increasing number of displaced people has created great need for shelter. We work to ensure that displaced people and returnees have dignified shelters for physical protection. Our teams:
- distribute mosquito nets, blankets, sleeping mats, and tools for farming
- provide emergency shelters for displaced populations in informal settings during acute phases of an emergency
- provide material support while constructing permanent shelters for returnees whose homes were destroyed during the conflict
Water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) promotion
We support local authorities in operating and maintaining water systems that provide drinking water. Our teams:
- distribute hygiene kits including items like soap and cloth for filtering water.
- distribute menstrual hygiene kits to women and girls
- distribute waste bins in schools
- repair broken boreholes and construct new ones
- train and support Water Management Committees
- support councils with spare parts and borehole maintenance toolkits
- construct emergency institutional and family latrines
- conduct hygiene promotion activities
Livelihoods and food security
We provide assistance to displaced people and those who return home, to improve their food security and revive their livelihoods. Our teams:
- distribute cash so that displaced people can access food
- distribute small livestock, seeds and agricultural inputs
- train women’s groups in Income Generating Activities and provide them with cash grants for start-up of activities
- train women in improved agricultural and food processing techniques
- Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida)
- Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (NMFA)
- Directorate-General for European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (ECHO)
- German Federal Foreign Office (GFFO)
- French Development Agency (AFD)
- Global Affairs Canada (GAC)
