Chad Appeal
Humanitarian Action for Children
UNICEF’s Humanitarian Action for Children appeal helps support the agency’s work as it provides conflict- and disaster-affected children with access to water, sanitation, nutrition, education, health and protection services. Return to main appeal page.
Chad snapshot
Appeal highlights
- Chad faces a combination of rapid-onset and protracted humanitarian crises that have been exacerbated by the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. Some 6.1 million people, including 3 million children, will require humanitarian assistance in 2022.
- Insecurity has led to increased population displacements, primarily of women and children, due to conflict, within the country and in neighbouring countries. Chad is affected by exceptionally heavy floods, droughts, epidemics and faces an unprecedented food and nutritional crisis increasing the burden of malnutrition. Access to basic services remains limited.
- UNICEF will provide a timely, coordinated and life-saving multi-sectoral humanitarian response in provinces facing recurrent population displacement and other crises, focusing on the needs of children and women.
- UNICEF requires US$83.9 million to provide assistance to vulnerable children and women affected by multiple humanitarian crises, with a focus on nutrition, education, WASH, and protection from violence, preventing further erosion of Chad's already fragile service provision systems. A systematic gender lens will be used in all analysis and programme design.
Key planned results for 2022
313,148 children admitted for treatment for severe acute malnutrition
140,000 people accessing a sufficient quantity of safe water
32,000 children / caregivers accessing mental health and psychosocial support
214,092 children receiving individual learning materials
Funding requirements for 2022
Country needs and strategy
Humanitarian needs
The humanitarian situation in Chad is best described as a prolonged multidimensional crisis caused by continued population displacements due to violence, natural disasters (including flooding and rainfall deficits), persistent food insecurity, high rates of malnutrition, economic crisis and political instability. Chad ranks 187 out of 189 countries on the Human Development Index, and an estimated 6.4 million Chadians live in poverty. Following political events in April 2021, the country entered into an 18-month transitional period with a transition government.
In 2022, there is an increase in people fleeing non-state armed groups in the Lake Chad Basin and seeking refuge in neighboring countries. Nearly 580,298 refugees reside in Chad including 42,518 Cameroonian refugees who arrived in late 2021 and some 381,289 Chadians are internally displaced. Insecurity in the Lake Chad Basin is limiting humanitarian actors’ capacity.
The nutritional situation remains alarming in Chad. According to the SMART 2021 survey, the prevalence of global acute malnutrition in children under 5 years of age is 10.9 per cent, including 2.0 per cent for severe acute malnutrition (SAM). It is estimated that 1.9 million acutely malnourished children aged 6 to 59 months will require treatment. Inadequate rainfall led to poor agricultural production with over 6 million people food insecure. These pressures are expected to be amplified by the effect of the war in Ukraine. The government declared a state of food security emergency in June 2022.
Despite progress, enormous challenges remain for vulnerable children to access quality education services across Chad, with 56.8 per cent of primary school-age children missing out on primary or secondary education. The number of displaced children needing access to education increased by 8 per cent between 2021 and 2022, stressing an already struggling education system to provide for all displaced children.
The fragile health system is under severe pressure from outbreaks of measles and the COVID-19 pandemic and remains vulnerable to epidemics such as cholera and chikungunya, as well as the spread of HIV and AIDS.
Climate change continues to impact Chad, increasing WASH needs across the country. The mortality rate attributable to unsafe WASH in Chad is 101/100,000, the highest in the world. In 2021, increased rainfall in some areas reached five-year highs with floods impacting 255,044 people, while low rainfall in other areas could impact food and nutrition security in 2022.
More than 360,000 displaced children remain extremely vulnerable to physical and sexual violence, psychosocial distress and exploitation, as well as recruitment by non-state armed groups. Gender-based violence remains at a very high level among internally displaced persons and in host communities.
UNICEF’s strategy
UNICEF humanitarian action in Chad aligns with the Country Programme Document 2017-2022, the Humanitarian Response Plan, and the Core Commitments for Children in Humanitarian Action. Informed by crisis risk analysis and lessons learned, UNICEF will focus on facilitating access to basic social services (including health, nutrition, education and child protection/social welfare) and building national and sub-national capacities to plan and respond to emergencies. Reinforcing complementarity of the humanitarian response and development programming will remain programmatic priorities. UNICEF aims to protect children and populations affected by crises and to strengthen measures to prevent sexual exploitation and abuse. Response to epidemic and disease outbreak prevention/control, including COVID-19 and HIV/AIDS, will remain crucial in 2022. UNICEF will support integrated vaccination campaigns to ensure that children remain protected against measles and other vaccine-preventable epidemic-prone diseases.
UNICEF will provide access to quality treatment for children suffering from SAM and prevention from all forms of malnutrition through community-based early detection, promotion of IYCF, vitamin A supplementation, and integrated nutrition, health and WASH interventions.
UNICEF will remain among the first responders to crises and provide essential household items, hygiene promotion, and access to safe drinking water and sanitation to reduce the risks of waterborne diseases.
UNICEF will ensure school attendance for crisis-affected children, prioritizing girls, through access to formal/non-formal education and provision of humanitarian cash transfers and school materials.
UNICEF will identify solutions that address the needs of women and girls, including through GBV mitigation, prevention and response; and engage them as active community members. The response will prioritize psychosocial and mental health services, community-based child protection, and support referral mechanisms for quality interventions targeting children released from non-state armed groups, unaccompanied and separated children, and survivors of GBV and mine hazards.
UNICEF will reinforce risk communication, jointly with adolescents and youth, and community engagement interventions. Established feedback and complaint mechanisms will address community concerns and misinformation, informing decision-making about age, gender and disability-sensitive response, applying AAP.
UNICEF humanitarian action will be coordinated with national and local authorities, UN agencies, and humanitarian partners, and will reinforce national emergency preparedness and response mechanisms, such as inter-cluster coordination. UNICEF will continue to lead the WASH, nutrition and education clusters and the child protection area of responsibility and fulfill its role within the Humanitarian Country Team.
The response will focus on provinces affected by displacements and/or the arrival of refugees in the Lake Chad Basin, the east and south of the country while addressing disease outbreaks and natural disasters.
Programme targets
Find out more about UNICEF's work
Highlights
Humanitarian Action is at the core of UNICEF’s mandate to realize the rights of every child. This edition of Humanitarian Action for Children – UNICEF’s annual humanitarian fundraising appeal – describes the ongoing crises affecting children in Chad; the strategies that we are using to respond to these situations; and the donor support that is essential in this response.
