U N I T E D N A T I O N S
Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)
Integrated Regional Information Network (IRIN)

ZAMBIA: New initiative to integrate refugees

JOHANNESBURG, 8 May (IRIN) - An ambitious project is underway in Zambia to
integrate refugees into their host community while helping the local region
to develop, UNHCR said in a statement on Wednesday.

The Zambia Initiative, proposed by the Zambian government with the support
of the refugee agency UNHCR and several donors, is a "holistic approach
aimed at linking development to relief assistance and addressing both the
needs of refugees and the host population," the statement said.

Among its many aims, the initiative seeks to change the perception that
refugees are a burden to their host communities. "We never thought that
refugees could be agents of development," a local chief was quoted by UNHCR
as saying. "We thought they were just here to cut our trees and use our
water."

The initial pilot project is focused on the Western Province of Zambia, an
area with a long history of hosting refugees. The region is home to the
Nangweshi refugee camp and the Myukwayukwa settlement, and still faces
continued refugee inflows from Angola. The number of refugees in the Western
Province is estimated at 150,000, including a number of
spontaneously-settled refugees.

The region faces challenging conditions, including the annual flooding of
the Zambezi river plains and poor rural infrastructure. But it also presents
great potential, with immense alluvial plains providing resources for cattle
grazing, irrigated crop production or fishing, the statement noted.

Refugees are expected to be "agents of development" by contributing to the
local economy. For instance, many refugees in Zambia have been allocated
enough land to enable them to produce export-quantities of sweet potatoes,
thus bringing much-needed foreign currency into the country, UNHCR said.

In January last year, the then Assistant High Commissioner for refugees,
Soren Jessen-Petersen, visited Zambia and discussed the possibility of UNHCR
playing a catalytic role in encouraging donors and development agencies to
contribute to the development of infrastructure in refugee-hosting
communities.

Concrete proposals for initially small-scale projects were put forward in
four major sectors – agriculture, healthcare, education and infrastructure.
The first proposed projects will represent an investment of US $5 million.
Donors are now expected to provide small grants quickly to jump-start the
initiative, allowing some of the projects to start as early as this year.

"The Zambia Initiative has the advantage of addressing both issues of
durable solutions for refugees and burden-sharing with their host
communities. It will facilitate the local integration of refugees and accord
high priority to the development of refugee-hosting areas. It will also
safeguard and improve the quality of the asylum system, since Zambia is
considered a model in this regard," UNHCR said.

[ENDS]

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