Since gaining independence in 1956, Sudanese have seen only occasional glimpses of national peace. Today, 220,000 Sudanese living in refugee camps in arid, eastern Chad as well as those rebuilding from civil war in central Sudan’s South Kordofan region require assistance with practically every aspect of life. Needs include food, medicine and clothes, but also longer-term resources such as basic education, income-generating skills and new homes and farms.

This Initiative will concentrate on two locations, with initial projects helping:

• Darfurians in Chadian refugee camps heal from trauma, educate their children and learn income-generating skills so they can survive and eventually return to their homelands
• Villagers rebuild their war-ravaged communities in South Kordofan’s Nuba Mountains area

Sudan’s 21-year north-south civil war came to an official end in 2005, but the conflict in Darfur is worse than ever. Continuing violence by government-backed

janjaweed militias in Darfur have left few community-based organizations providing help to the Sudanese who need it most.

Initiative Profile »

Sudanese taking refuge in neighboring Chad need daily survival resources, such as clean water, nutritious food and basic healthcare. They also need longer-term interventions, such as psychosocial counseling, education and vocational skills. Because of the intensity of the conflict and the limited access for humanitarian organizations, Geneva Global has determined that working through experienced international nongovernmental organizations (INGOs) is the best way to mitigate the conflict’s ravages in Darfur as effectively and as quickly as possible.

While Sudanese in South Kordofan have not received as much global media attention as their countrymen in Darfur, isolated residents of the Nuba Mountains also suffered mass killings. Progress is slow, but signs of hope are clear. An estimated 1.8 million Sudanese have returned to their villages in central Southern Sudan since 2005; many found

their homes destroyed and lack access to credit or sustainable livelihoods.

“Today is a time of opportunity in Southern Sudan, where people are returning to their homes and where we can really make a difference,” says Anna Pienaar, a Geneva Global conflict recovery sector analyst. “In the first year, we will be focusing on mitigating the worst effects of the Darfur conflict.”

Sudan in Focus »

Violence in Sudan has displaced so many people that practically every basic necessity of life must be addressed. Geneva Global will address conflict recovery in Sudan by building social well-being, promoting economic activity and equipping the next generation. Projects will include efforts to build peace and reconciliation in communities devastated by conflict. They will include vocational skills training in locations where such interventions are possible, and within camps in eastern Chad. Greater stability could lay the groundwork for business training and microfinance.

Schools in Sudan are few, and many people remain illiterate. Projects will support educational needs and teacher training in refugee camps in Chad. Remedial education will be provided for children who have missed school as a result of the conflict. Many of the children who will benefit from this Initiative

never attended school, and many were orphaned by war or AIDS.

Half of this Initiative’s investment will provide development assistance to refugees who fled Darfur to Chad; the rest will help communities recover from the long-term effects of Sudan’s civil war in the Nuba Mountains region.

Alan Vian and his wife Lynne recently returned from a two-month stay in Chad where, as former teachers, they volunteered to help Christian Outreach for Relief & Development (CORD) train teachers in camps at Bredjing and Treguine. “In these two camps, there are 230 teachers currently teaching a total of 16,560 children - a ratio of 72 children to every teacher,” Alan Vian says. “Most of the school buildings, built from local materials just 15 months ago, were showing signs of wear and tear due to the hot weather. Some children have to be taught outside in the open air where there is no shade, and where the temperature was as high as 115 degrees. Most of the teaching involved learning by rote and blackboards from which the children copied into their exercise books.” Textbooks were scarce, though CORD staff used the “school in a box” from UNICEF. Most of the lessons involved basic literacy and mathematics. “If ever we need an example that a school is not the building, nor the books, nor the blackboards, it is the people within it, this was it,” he says.