Executive Summary
Intensifying conflict and slow and sudden-onset disaster are taking their toll. The result is that global financial requirements for the remainder of 2015 have risen by $2.4 billion. In early June 2015 they stand at $18.8 billion, to meet the needs of 78.9 million vulnerable people in 37 countries.
In February, a regional appeal for the Sahel was launched, requesting $1.98 billion to enable partners to meet the needs of some 9.3 million people in nine countries with food assistance. In Djibouti, partners have revised the multi-year strategy first developed in 2014.
They now seek $81 million. Over 40 per cent of Djibouti’s population is food insecure. The humanitarian landscape continues to evolve in Djibouti. By May, 9,700 people from Yemen had crossed the border. So far 1,600 of them have been registered as refugees. The latest global ask of $18.8 billion includes inter-agency response plans for Guatemala and Honduras, where persistent droughts have resulted in crop failures and deepening food insecurity. In Libya humanitarian conditions have worsened considerably in 2015. Ongoing hostilities and increased presence of non-state armed groups have affected 2 million people in the country while approximately 2.5 million others need access to health services. In addition, 400,000 people require food assistance. The escalation of the conflict in Yemen, the devastation wrought by Cyclone Pam in Vanuatu, and the highly destructive earthquakes in Nepal all led to the development of flash appeals.
Across the 37 countries, humanitarian crises show no sign of abating. Violence and insecurity due to the scale of conflict in Syria, Yemen, Iraq and Nigeria continue to cause internal and cross-border displacements. In Syria, for example, some 7.6 million people have been internally displaced, while another 4 million have fled the country. Humanitarian partners require $7.4 billion to respond to the needs of 12.2 million people inside Syria, including more than 5.6 million children, and to help people affected by this crisis in Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey.
Although millions of people are receiving desperately needed aid, access problems are still limiting the delivery of humanitarian assistance. Conditions are harsh for the 4.8 million people living in hard-to-reach and besieged locations in Syria where there is little or no access to humanitarian assistance for months at a time. In Iraq, the scale of the conflict has increased significantly. About 2.8 million people are internally displaced, half of whom are children. The number of newly displaced people has increased by 700,000 this year alone. Recently improved tracking methods have helped identify these numbers.
In Nigeria, sustained attacks by the Boko Haram armed group have displaced an estimated 1.5 million people and forced 210,000 to flee across Nigeria’s border, where they have become refugees in Cameroon, Chad, and Niger.
Violence, insecurity and restricted access continue to aggravate risk and hamper humanitarian operations in DRC, Libya, Somalia and Sudan. In addition, protection of civilians due to unrelenting hostilities in Iraq, Nigeria, Syria and Yemen remains a grave concern. Gross and flagrant violations of human rights and international humanitarian law are rife. In Iraq, targeted attacks on civilians and sexual and gender-based violence prevail.
Food insecurity remains a recurring theme in most of the countries covered in this document. In Iraq, for example, food insecurity has increased by 60 per cent in six months. In DRC, 6.4 million people are food insecure — half are chronically undernourished children under age five. Malnutrition is even more endemic in Kasais and Bas-Congo Provinces, where it has caused 35 per cent of deaths among children under age five. In Nigeria,
4.6 million people are food insecure and 100,000 children are at risk of severe malnutrition this year. In Sudan, some 4.2 million people are expected to experience acute food insecurity during the upcoming lean season. In South Sudan, failure to intervene effectively could put millions at risk of starvation. Twenty per cent of Chad’s population of over 2.4 million people is food insecure. In Somalia, about 731,000 Somali people face acute food insecurity, while an additional 2.3 million are at risk of sliding into the same situation. In The Gambia, an estimated 500,000 people will be food insecure.
Donors have generously contributed $4.8 billion to humanitarian response plans, but that only represents 26 per cent of requirements, leaving a vast shortfall of $14 billion. Over half of the funding received (55 per cent) has gone to the highest-level emergencies, categorized as Level 3 crises, in Central African Republic,
Iraq, South Sudan and Syria. These crises have dominated 2015 and will continue to do so. The appeal for Vanuatu is the best funded at 54 per cent; the least funded humanitarian response plan is The Gambia, at 2 per cent. Clearly, the level of funding cannot match the level of need. Operations in several countries have been curtailed and risk shutdown if additional donor support is not secured immediately. In Iraq, for example, 60 per cent of frontline operations risk cut backs or complete stoppage. Health services in camps have been interrupted and food distributions scaled back due to underfunding. In Libya, underfunding has caused some agencies to decrease or shut down humanitarian programmes, with food distribution interrupted due to lack of funds.
The financial demands of the combined appeals are not only substantial, they are also essential for protecting, feeding, sheltering and saving the lives of millions of people in critical need.