Rabat – Food insecurity and malnutrition are on the rise in the Sahrawi refugee camps, leading the UN team in Algeria to call for urgent food and nutritional aid to the refugees.
According to the UN, food rations in the Tindouf camps have been reduced by 75%, resulting in mounting concerns.
Despite ongoing international assistance, the funds needed for refugee food assistance have doubled to $39 million this year, up from $19.8 million before the outbreak of COVID-19, the local UN team declared.
“The UN team and other humanitarian actors are facing significant funding gaps caused by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the resulting global rise in food and fuel prices, and the effects of the war in Ukraine,” said UN Resident Coordinator Alejandro Alvarez.
“This situation has profoundly affected all sectors of humanitarian assistance, worryingly hampering refugees’ access to food, water, health, nutrition, education, and other essential livelihood services,” he added.
Read also: UN Chief Raises Concern About Acute Malnutrition in Tindouf Camps
Because of these growing issues, Sahrawi refugees’ purchasing power began to dwindle, making it increasingly difficult to meet their basic requirements.
Now, with reduced food rations, each beneficiary receives less than 5 kilograms of food, compared to the planned 17 kilograms per person per month.
According to a recent UN preliminary nutrition survey’s findings, the nutritional situation is deteriorating, causing the prevalence of life-threatening health issues among children aged 6-59 months to increase from 7.6% in 2019 to 10.7% in 2022.
The survey also confirmed that half of these children are anemic, one in three is stunted, and only one in three receives the minimally diverse diet required for good growth and development.
Malnutrition has long been a problem in the Tindouf camps, with the UN highlighting the importance of finding solutions.
Calls from international actors, including the EU, for a transparent census of the camps’ population, have been repeatedly blocked by Polisario officials, who have been accused of defrauding incoming humanitarian aid.
The Tindouf camps are the only refugee camps in the world that do not share data about their occupants, with some former refugees claiming that only 20% of the camp’s population are actually Sahrawi.
