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- Also available in French
GNA Ecuador: Q&A with Xavier Créach, Head of UNHCR Field Office, Lago Agrio, Ecuador
Global Needs Assessment, 9 October 2008
You work regularly on the Ecuadorian side of the Colombian-Ecuadorian border, a conflict-torn area. What's it like working there?
It's a border operation in the Amazon forest, where refugees arrive fleeing the conflict in Colombia. The situation is so volatile that every day is different. One moment you may be planning health and education projects with local and provincial authorities, the next you are trying to find a short- and mid-term solution for 150 refugees who just crossed the border and are stuck in some remote corner of the jungle.
Why do UNHCR and its partners work along the Putumayo River?
The San Miguel and Putumayo rivers are the natural frontier separating Ecuador from Colombia. Nearly all the refugees in this province come from Colombia. The communities on the Ecuador side of the border are an accessible arrival point for many refugees who just cross the border and settle on the other side of the river. But these communities are also extremely exposed to the conflict, and the physical security of their inhabitants is hardly guaranteed. Even the local Ecuadorian population living in this area has traditionally been deprived of basic services such as documentation, water and sanitation, health, education, etc., and so are very vulnerable. Of course, this reflects on the living conditions of the refugee population who for the most part, don´t have any other choice but to stay here because getting established here is much cheaper than anywhere else in the country.
How do you work with these communities and refugees along the border?
Because 60 to 80 percent of the people living along the border are refugees, and their living conditions are very similar to those of local Ecuadorians, our strategy is to support the community as a whole. This starts by assessing the situation of the communities, involving community leaders as well as women and children. These assessments are conducted jointly by UNHCR with partner agencies, and local authorities.
This year, we identified health and water and sanitation as top priorities. There are not many indicators available for this part of the country, but we found that child mortality in border communities was high and life expectancy particularly low in comparison with national average. Only three out of 1,000 persons living in border communities along the Putumayo River are over 60 years old. Diseases such as malaria and dengue fever are widespread.
This has led us to formulate and implement projects with NGOs and local authorities. We opened a health centre in one community (benefiting 5,000 persons), we trained health promoters in all river communities and equipped them with first-aid kits, and refitted and equipped a Health Department boat which provides medical and dental care to all communities on the bank of River Putumayo at least one day a month in each community – a considerable advance compared to the previous system, in which communities received health care once every six months, if any at all.
How good a job do you think UNHCR and our NGO partners are doing in meeting the refugees' needs?
In spite of the tremendous needs, there are very few humanitarian actors on the Ecuadorian side of the border. Fortunately there is a very good, day-to-day coordination among us. I think the strength of UNHCR's partners lies in their diversity and expertise: we work with local NGOs, such as the Ecuadorian Red Cross, who know the area very well and have built up confidence in border communities over the years. On the other hand, international partners such as Italian NGO COOPI, bring their international expertise.
It sounds like an ambitious project, trying to provide basic services to all border communities ...
It is necessary. Plus, we don't do it all by ourselves. We provide technical and financial support and catalyse the intervention of relevant state institutions. However, availability of funds is limited, and this obliges us to choose some communities over others. For instance, we identified a clear need for clean water systems in at least 20 river communities. Nevertheless, this year our budget has allowed us to invest and construct, with the help of our partners, four water systems only. As regards education, another urgent priority, some children still don't have access even to primary schools, and secondary education is a luxury that hardly anyone can afford.
Hopefully the GNA initiative for Ecuador will allow us to raise the necessary funds to implement community-based protection and integration projects in all communities in need. In a conflict zone, with presence of regular and irregular armed actors, guaranteeing access to public services is also a way to relieve the civilian population from complete isolation.
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