The West and Central Africa region is beset with some of the world’s most acute and prolonged crises. Deep poverty, rapid population growth, climate change, chronically high food insecurity and malnutrition continue to drive extreme levels of vulnerability. The COVID-19 pandemic, related prevention measures and socioeconomic consequences are deeply affecting fragile communities. Conflict in the region’s hotspots persists or has worsened.
The compounded impact on the most vulnerable people is devastating and causing unprecedented, fast-escalating needs. Compared to last year, the number of people in need in the region has increased by 35 per cent. More than 1 person in 10 – over 60 million people – will require assistance and protection in 2021. Close to 1,000 humanitarian partner organizations are working across the region to respond to the most urgent needs of these people. Relief operations and local capacity require further scale-up, but funding is not keeping up.
Gao, Mali
People who fled Mondoro are seen at the camp for displaced people of Gao on October 13, 2020. The displaced, who fled violent clashes in central Mali, arrived at the site at the end of 2018. According to the latest census, the site hosts around 600 displaced households.
Climate change and extreme weather events are a major driver of needs. Droughts are becoming more recurrent and severe, threatening livelihoods in vulnerable rural communities. Rainfall is irregular and increasingly unpredictable. In 2020, flooding has affected 2.3 million people in 18 countries of the region, resulting in the destruction of goods, land and livestock.
In conflict-affected regions, civilians are facing a dramatic protection crisis. Almost 13 million people had to flee their homes, 1.5 million more than one year ago. Insecurity and violence are threatening lives and livelihoods, increasing human rights violations, including sexual and gender-based violence, and jeopardizing social cohesion. Insecurity is also constraining humanitarian access, leaving communities without essential assistance and exposing aid workers to increased risks.
Violence and climate shocks also are the main drivers of a dramatic food crisis. Across the region, more than 40 million people are facing severe food insecurity. If conditions deteriorate, hunger hotspots in north-east Nigeria and Burkina Faso risk slipping into famine within months.
In the Sahel, forced displacement is at an unprecedented high, with 5 million people uprooted from their homes. More than 14 million people are acutely food insecure – two times more than one year ago. In the Central Sahel (Burkina Faso, Mali and western Niger) insecurity has rapidly deteriorated. Since 2018, the number of IDPs has risen twentyfold. In the Lake Chad Basin, incursions and violent incidents remain common, leading to additional displacement and needs.
In the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and the Central African Republic (CAR), long-running conflict and protracted crises continue to affect millions of people, with severe protection risks, forced displacement and high levels of food insecurity. In western Cameroon, violent conflict in the south-west and north-west regions has displaced more than 700,000 people.
In 2021, the situation of millions of children, men and women affected by crisis in West and Central Africa remains critical. The trend in the Sahel points to further deterioration, with significant risk of spillover into coastal countries. The recent coup d’état in Mali and disputed elections in Guinea and Côte d’Ivoire have increased political and intercommunal tension. Upcoming elections in Burkina Faso, Niger, CAR and Chad will be set in contexts of insecurity. In Cameroon, solutions to the crisis in the anglophone regions are yet to materialize. In CAR, the peace agreement is regularly violated to the detriment of the protection of civilians, and new conflict hotspots in eastern DRC have caused more violence and forced displacement.
Source: OCHA
Source: OCHA
Analysis of the context, crisis and needs
In 2020, Chad was affected by growing insecurity within its borders and within neighboring countries, economic fragility intensified by the COVID-19 pandemic, a precarious health context, and the impact of destructive climate-related events. The pandemic’s socioeconomic impact exacerbated pre-existing vulnerabilities, including of people – many of whom are women – working in the informal sector. The context was marked by the closure of borders, a collapse of the oil price, a rise in food prices and initial paralysis of the economic fabric, including high levels of unemployment for several months.
The security situation continued to be of concern in Lac province, including clashes between non-State armed groups and the Chadian Army and the declaration of a ‘no-go zone’ for civilians. As a result, the number of IDPs in that province increased to 336,000 – a 98 per cent rise compared to 2019. In southern and eastern Chad, some 480,000 refugees from the Central African Republic (CAR) and Sudan still depend on humanitarian assistance. Nearly 20,000 new refugees arrived in eastern Chad in 2020 due to the persistence of intercommunal clashes in Darfur. Intercommunal conflict between farmers and herders has also continued, particularly in the south.
