In the Democratic Republic of Congo, UNHCR is assisting internally displaced people, including women and children who face particular vulnerabilities. This includes providing legal services and facilitating access to medical and psychosocial aid for survivors of gender-based violence. UNHCR also provides cash assistance to the most vulnerable among the displaced and returnees, and distributes aid to households such as blankets, sleeping mats, soap and jerry cans.

UNHCR is also supporting the internally displaced people who are able to return to their homes – this includes skill and technical training to help facilitate livelihoods, by for example improving the yields of their farming fields and generate better incomes.

Following the eruption of Mount Nyiragongo in 2021, UNHCR helped move over 2,000 displaced families who could not return to their homes in Goma, from interim shelters at schools to sustainable housing. Other families were provided cash assistance for rent so that they could leave crowded conditions and find safer accommodation.

One of the ways UNHCR assists vulnerable displaced Yemeni and refugee families to meet their most basic and pressing needs is by distributing multi-purpose cash assistance, rental subsidies, and emergency and winter cash. Families can access basic items and services with this money, and decide for themselves how to spend it in the best way to meet their needs.

In addition, UNHCR distributes shelter kits, mats and plastic sheets that help families repair their homes, which have been damaged in the conflict, and provide some privacy and protection to those living in collective buildings.

In Somalia, UNHCR is e.g. providing dignity kits, psychosocial counselling, medical and legal referrals to internally displaced people who have survived gender-based violence. In addition, through its partners, UNHCR is providing maternal and child healthcare, capacity building for school headteachers, and assists with the payment of school fees and meal allowances.

In response to the drought in Somalia, UNHCR has scaled up its protection response, a process which includes implementing gender-based violence prevention and identifying and responding to the needs of particularly vulnerable people. The agency has reached more than 188,000 people, while prioritizing drought-affected areas as well as people who are especially vulnerable, such as women, the elderly, and people with disabilities.

Approximately 146,000 internally displaced people as well as the host community have received basic household items such as kitchen sets, blankets, and jerry cans. A further 33,000 internally displaced people have benefited from shelter support, and UNHCR is also distributing cash assistance, reaching almost 70,000 people and allowing drought affected families to prioritize and address their own needs.

To help assist and protect the millions of internally displaced in Syria, UNHCR has distributed basic aid such as kitchen sets, blankets, and solar lamps to 90,600 families to improve the quality of their daily life. 26,500 people with specific needs, including people with disabilities, have received special assistance, including with much needed medical devices. UNHCR also supports internally displaced Syrians with in repairing damaged homes and helping people to restart their livelihoods.

Moreover, UNHCR has increased the access to safe and equitable formal education for children in Syria. As power shortages leave children in the dark and unable to study, the agency is also distributing essential equipment to female-headed households, such as solar panels, batteries, bulbs, and cables. In addition, UNHCR-supported community centres who have reached almost one million people in 2022, have for example provided catch-up classes for children and other child protection activities. UNHCR is also helping to rebuild schools so that children can access education.

In order to respond to the diverse and complex needs of internally displaced people in Afghanistan, UNHCR has provided approximately 976,000 individuals with cash assistance so that they can prioritize their needs themselves. Access to health services was improved for hundreds of thousands of people as UNHCR helped build clinics, including maternity health facilities – and in total more than 4 .1 million people benefitted from community-based interventions. 

In addition, UNHCR has made sure that displaced people in the remote mountainous areas received household supplies such as tents, blankets, jerry cans for water, plastic sheeting, kitchen utensils and solar lamps. UNHCR’s so-called winterization-programme has ensured that 380,000 people have been supported with heating. 

In response to the immediate needs of internally displaced people in Mozambique, UNHCR is distributing basic aid items such as blankets, sleeping mats, mosquito nets, buckets and jerry cans to families. UNHCR also provides psychosocial counselling, and more than 118,000 people now have access to gender-based violence services.

Furthermore, as violence and in particular weather events, such as Cyclone Gombe have destroyed homes and forced people to flee, UNHCR is providing shelters and is building more shelters, particularly for vulnerable families. As the country is amongst the worst affected by extreme weather conditions, the shelters are more resilient and made with local materials and techniques, thus contributing to the local economy and reducing the environmental footprint.