October 2013
Save the Children’s Humanitarian Response to the
Syrian Refugee Crisis in Lebanon
BEKAA VALLEY PROGRAMME OVERVIEW
There are an estimated 300,0001 Syrian refugees in the Bekaa valley. In some towns, the Syrian refugee population now
outnumbers that of the host population. Traditionally, many areas along the Bekaa valley have hosted Syrian seasonal
migrants, working mostly in agriculture, construction and services as the Bekaa is one of the main agricultural areas of
Lebanon2.
Save the Children is working to help some of the most vulnerable host community families and Syrian refugees, in
response to the large numbers of Syrian refugees who have arrived in this area. Many of the refugees arrive with little or
no savings, having often come from poor income areas within Syria, and having already used up any savings they did
have by being forced to move from place to place within Syria trying to escape the conflict before resorting to seeking
refuge in Lebanon. Due to the increased availability of cheap labour as a result of the Syrian refugee influx, there are
increasing tensions between the Syrian refugees and the Lebanese host communities who have seen wages halve and
employment opportunities dwindle as they compete for work in a hugely oversaturated marketplace3.
SHELTER
A number of informal tented settlements already existed along
the valley, inhabited by Syrian migrant workers. However, over
the past two years, many thousands of people have arrived
seeking to rent properties, to live in unfinished buildings,
garages or where no other option remains, to live in informal
settlements.
Across Lebanon, two thirds of refugee families were renting
accommodation (many in poor condition and expensive relative
to income or savings), or living with host families, while 15%
were living in garages or unfinished buildings, 14% were living in
informal settlements with the remainder living in collective
shelters 4. As the registered refugee numbers exceed 885,000 Marian, five years old, at a refugee settlement near the Syrian border.
in Lebanon, it is estimated that more
1
According to UNHCR figures on the 10th December. However, the Government of Lebanon estimates the numbers are
significantly higher.
2
Estimates vary from 300,000 to 600,000 across Lebanon Syrians working in Lebanon before the crisis. SNAP:Regional Analysis 26 th
September 2013
3
As is often reported, one example here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/syrian-refugees-in-lebanoncompete-for-jobs-aggravating-social-tensions-in-country/2013/10/03/cfa0d498-2c57-11e3-b141-298f46539716_story.html
4 Up from 11% in April 2013
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than a quarter of a million people may be living in
makeshift dwellings 5 , tents and other types of
collective shelters or informal settlements across
Lebanon.
Save the Children6 is working to provide shelter
assistance for vulnerable families, and provide cash
for rehabilitation of unfinished buildings and sealing
off (quick fix) kits for families living in informal
settlements, garages, and hazardous buildings or in
unfinished buildings where their landlords refuse our
offer to help rehabilitate their buildings. We are also
providing New Arrival Shelter kits in the informal
settlements.
Shelter distribution in Northern Bekaa on 1st Oct 2013
We have now helped hundreds of households to rehabilitate their homes as part of our innovative Cash for Rehabilitation
scheme. We’re offering each family up to $1,500 to carry out works to improve their living conditions, from installing door
frames and doors, internal partitions, windows, installing electricity, to basic sanitary work, including a kitchen sink, water
tanks etc. Given the cold winters here, this is particularly important. As there are often several families living in one unfinished
building, this means we are able to offer more support if each family receives this payment. The cash assistance is provided
over 3 payments, 20% initially, then two subsequent payments of 40%. One of the conditions for this cash for rehabilitation is
that we agree an MoU with landlords to ensure they will allow tenure for their tenants for at least one year, and that they will
offer a reduced rent. Nevertheless, rents have soared across Lebanon over the past two years, and many landlords are charging
upwards of $300 per month to
live in draughty and damp conditions in unfinished building and garages.
In the informal settlements we have been providing Quick Fix kits to help bolster existing tents. The shelter team has
distributed over 8,000 quick fix kits in the informal tented settlements and 1,600 new arrival kits since August
2013.
These kits are designed to allow beneficiary families to repair, reinforce and extend their shelters.
Families are supported with technical guidance and labour support where necessary. We are not permitted to install
permanent structures in these settlements, so have worked to provide items which will help improve structures and
weatherproofing. Every time we distribute kits in a settlement, we operate a helpdesk to ensure inhabitants can raise
their concerns and we can share information.
Save the Children will provide a comprehensive package of assistance to New Arrival families in the Informal Settlements
in its areas of operation. This activity is integrated with the Food Security and Livelihood activities and includes the
5
http://data.unhcr.org/syrianrefugees/working_group.php?Page=Country&LocationId=122&Id=22
6
Our Shelter programme started in December 2012 and is currently scaling up significantly.
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October 2013
provision of Non Food Items (Kitchen Set, Hygiene Kit, Blankets and Mattresses), Shelter Kit, food packages and cash
assistance.
FOOD SECURITY & LIVELIHOODS
For newly arrived families7, Save the Children is distributing new arrival kits to vulnerable households most in need of
assistance. These kits include kitchen sets, blankets, mattresses and hygiene kits. We have just received funding to
accompany these kits with food parcels to new arrivals. We also provide unconditional cash assistance to vulnerable
families as part of our winterization work to help prepare families for the upcoming winter.
For unregistered households, we provide $300 per month over 5 months8 (from November to March), and to
registered households we provide reduced monthly payments as they will also qualify for UNHCR support9. We have
assisted 650 unregistered refugee households so far in Bekaa, with plans to support another 500 households, and hope
to reach 7,950 registered households in the coming
months10. Winterisation cash and blanket
distributions ongoing (under UNHCR, DfID and
ECHO), and so far we have reached 1450
households reached ( 7245 persons).
We are also running Cash for Work programmes in
the Bekaa, which includes skills and life skills
training for youth from the host and Syrian
community. We are running cash based public
works improving settlements across the Bekaa11
providing cash to 6,660 beneficiaries in return for
their contribution to this work. The community
support program has started in 30 sites throughout
the Bekaa involving 3,330 Lebanese and Syrian
labourers.
Adults participating in our Cash for Work Program, Bekaa
Save the Children is also implementing home based CFW interventions aimed at female headed or very vulnerable
households where working outside of the home is not feasible. We are running cash based youth focused projects
targeting 150 youth in Central Bekaa (in Bar Elias and Majdal Anjar funded by JPF) aimed at providing life skills training,
and allowing youth to design and implement projects which benefit their community.
Similar projects are also operational with SIDA Hum training providing life skills training and a range of options for youth
to attend, focusing on humanitarian skills building, social work projects or vocational training. In return for attending
these sessions, we pay $200 per month for 3 months to the youth attending, as well as looking to help these participants
to gain experience in the sectors they are interested in.
7
Who have arrived in Lebanon less than 3 months ago. Registration with UNHCR can take up to 3 months, and many families are
fearful of registering for fear of being identified and their information being sent back to Syria.
8
To meet food and non-food needs, fuel and heater needs
9
An initial payment of $150, then 4 subsequent monthly payments of $100. Our payments to unregistered are to equal the amount
of assistance plus cash a registered household would receive.
10
We are currently awaiting confirmation of funding to provide food parcels in informal settlement s across Bekaa
11
In 30 sites across Bekaa
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For the community projects, participants are encouraged to form groups and work together, and are each given a small
budget which pooled can be used to fund specific projects. We have enrolled 110 youth in this scheme currently, and
are keen to look at increasing this innovative programme model with more funding.
EDUCATION
Save the Children have been running Accelerated Learning programmes to help host and Syrian children to catch up
before term begins. Syrian children face particular challenges in Lebanon – many have been out of school for 2 years or
more, the curriculum is tri-lingual and taught in English or French whereas most Syrian children speak only Arabic. This
makes it especially difficult for older children to keep up when classes are being taught in a foreign language with a
foreign alphabet. Syrian children often face other challenges too – transport can be expensive and is often given as the
main obstacle to accessing schools, and bullying in host community schools has also been reported.
We’re working with UNHCR, UNICEF, the Ministry of Education (MEHE)
and other actors in the Back to School campaign which is working to
ensure that the majority of school age Syrian children get to be in
formal and non-formal education by September 2014. There are an
estimated 400,000 school age Syrian children currently in Lebanon. Last
year, the public school system managed to open up 30,000 spaces for
these children; a further 13,000 places will be made available for
2013/14. The second shift currently aims to enroll 30,000 students but
this still means 90% of these children remain out of school, some for the
third consecutive year.
© Inge Lie/ Save the Children
We are registering 10,000 school children (UNHCR funded) into 46 public schools across Bekaa. These children range from
Kindergarten to secondary school12. We will be paying the registration fees, providing uniforms, bags, books and stationery
to all of these children. We also want to ensure all children living more than 3km from a school are offered free transport to
school. So far, 3944 children are registered for back to Back to school campaign in 46 schools, 1849 in the second shift.
We are running ALP sessions13 over 3 months in 10 schools for over 2,500 children, aged 8-14 years who are not
registered in schools, which runs a MEHE accredited curriculum on Math, Arabic and French or English. There are 3 levels
for ALP and placement tests will qualify which level is appropriate for each child. Once a child completes the ALP, efforts
are made to enroll this child in school. Once in school, we provide remedial classes in English or French (depending on
which language lessons are taught in their schools
12
Although we are finding that very few Syrian children attend secondary school as they are often working to help support their
families by this age.
13 Funded by UNHCR and starting October 2013
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CHILD PROTECTION
We are working in 5 Child Friendly Spaces across Bekaa (one of these is only youth focused located in Qab Elias, and one
CFS is run by our implementing partner, LAY). We also run mother support groups which allows mothers to come
together to voice issues and support each other. We are now encouraging these groups to start hosting these in their
homes to ensure these networks are sustained within their communities. Mother support groups are one of the aspects
of the programme where we constantly receive direct feedback, with mothers telling us that they now feel accepted,
they now talk to each other and support each other as neighbours, and they share ideas about how to support their
children.
Each CFS is slightly different14, but are aimed at all
age groups 0-18 years, and provide recreational
activities, such as expressive art sessions and dance
classes, and these will change every day. We are also
providing Arabic and English sessions as this is
repeatedly requested for by children and parents.
We are currently reaching 650 children through our
CFS’ and 25 mothers as part of the mother and
toddler groups and mother support groups. We aim
to reach 1,480 children and 80 mothers as our
programme expands. We will also be supporting a
community network project targeting 80 parents and
outreach protection messaging and awareness
raising to 1,000 individuals15. We will soon be
implementing education activities under SIDA Hum,
reaching a further 1,600 children and 200 mothers.
Some of the arts and crafts produced by children attending our CFS in Majdel Anjar
Ensuring vulnerable children have a place to play, to
interact with other children, and to have a fun in safe environment hosted by dedicated and enthusiastic animators, can
make an enormous difference in allowing them some space to be a child, to just have fun. Many of these children are
living in difficult conditions, in inadequate shelter, where food is limited, and they have few toys and home comforts.
Many of these children are feeling the impact of the conflict in Syria, many tell stories of having not seen their father or
brothers in months and many do not know if family members who disappeared are still alive. This is a hugely stressful
situation and children will feel this pressure from their family members and sometimes families struggle to cope with the
strain, and children become victims of domestic abuse as a result. Our teams working in the CFS’ have seen dramatic
differences over the past months. Children are often very shy and quiet when they first arrive, many are traumatised by
what they have been through, but soon start to gain confidence in our CFS and ALP sessions, and are visibly much
happier and engaged after a while.
14
We also face constant challenges, from being refused access to a site we had wanted to operate from in Baalbeck, to funding
constraints. In another school, we rehabilitated some unused classrooms and the football pitch 14, but now the school wants to use
these classrooms, and we are being forced to close this CFS at the end of October 14.
15
As of early October, we were reaching 650 children and 25 mothers in Bekaa as part of our CP work
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In addition, mothers support groups and mothers and toddlers groups are being run regularly in several locations where
CFS or community centres are operating.
In Qab Elias dozens of youth are volunteering in community and 16 animators have been trained. Community mobilization
is taking place in Tamnin Al Faoqa and Ali al Nahri. 200 children are registered Tamnin al Faoqa and 160 in Ali Al Nahri. In
addition, 150 boys and girls are participating in life skills training through sports and other forms of recreation in Baalbek.
Awareness activities on hygiene took place in 3 centers reaching 640 children.
HEALTH & NUTRITION
Save the Children is providing free primary healthcare for vulnerable households through healthcare centres we are
supporting in Bar Elias and Qab Elias. Since February 2013, we have supported almost 16,000 people to receive
healthcare and are now seeing an average patient flow of 150 patients per day.
Our community health workers carry out door to door visits
raising awareness on hygiene issues, malnutrition and key health
messages, including support to pregnant mothers. We’re trying
to target the most vulnerable households and are currently
recruiting more health workers to help increase the number of
households we are able to reach. House visits in central Bekaa
have reached over 441 Households since September 2013
We will be running sessions with youth on adolescent and
reproductive health in the Qab Elias facility and hope to recruit
frontline workers as part of an integrated programme covering
FSL, shelter and health in Baalbeck in the coming months.
Health Clinic in Bekaa, where children and pregnant women receive
In October, the Merlin programme transitioned into the
free medical consultations
Save the Children programme, under which DEC funding has
been secured to set up two mobile teams to conduct malnutrition screening across the Bekaa area. With DFID
funding, we will now be operating in two health facilities in Baalbeck offering free primary healthcare for vulnerable
households and distributing newborn and hygiene kits16.
16
We aim to support 2,895 children and 464 pregnant women with this project, and distribute 464 Newborn kits and 1,500 hygiene
kits over 7 months to April 2014.
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