EU-Financed Program to Help Refugees Integrate in E. Ethiopia
ADDIS ABEBA – European Union-funded Comprehensive Refugee Response Framework (CRRF) program with the value of 20 million Euros has been launched in Jigjiga town of Somali regional state today.
The program aims to support Ethiopia to shift from a ‘care and maintenance’ or camp-based model of refugee assistance to an approach that encourages refugees to become self-reliance, said the Delegation of the European Union to Ethiopia said in a statement.
The program will ease pressure on Ethiopia by fostering sustainable, integrated solutions for both refugees and host communities in response to their developmental needs and aspirations, it added.
The Program will support the transition of targeted refugees into local structures by including them into the national safety net scheme, the Urban Productive Safety Net Program.
It will take “due account of the need to ensure equal treatment of refugees and members of the host community”, the statement reads.
The newly launched program will mainly be implemented in the Somali Regional State with a focus on the Jigjiga area and the refugee camps and surrounding host communities.
In addition, capacity building and technical assistance will be carried out at the federal level in Addis Ababa as well as at regional and local levels in Somali Regional State and in selected other refugee-hosting regions of Ethiopia.
European Union says the program has three components.
Component 1 will be implemented by UNHCR aiming to successfully enhance organizational and technical capacities.
UNHCR will work together with the civil society partner Regional Durable Solutions Secretariat in East and Horn of Africa (ReDSS) to ensure that analytical skills and expertise in the field of durable solutions and displacement in the Horn of Africa are included.
Component 2 will be implemented by the Government of Ethiopia through its line Ministries in charge of the Urban Productive Safety Net Program (UPSNP).
Component 3 will be implemented through a direct award of a grant to a consortium of organizations.
