The Challenges & Improvements in Za’atari Camp

My name is Ali Al-Jadooa; currently I am the Admin/Support Manager in JEN(Japan Emergency NGO), and I joined JEN in February 2013 as a community mobilization manager; at that time JEN was involved in hygiene promotion and clothes distribution to the refugees in Za’atari camp.

 (Hygiene session with the community)                          

(Cloth distribution to the refugees in 2013)

Za’atari camp opened in July 2012 after the crises started in Syria and it’s located in Jordan, 13 km from Syrian border; the camp was named Za’atari camp as the location of that land was in Za’atari village. The size of the camp is 6 km2. During that time, Syrian people had to leave their houses forcedly without any luggage while they sought for any safe zone. By the end, they reached to the Jordan border and arrived to Zaatari camp with the help of the Jordanian army.

 (Zaatari Camp in 2013)              

 (Public water tank installation in Zaatari camp)

Due to unexpected continuous entering of large numbers of refugees on a daily basis, the logistics services of NGOs easily went over the capacity, and as a result, the refugees were frustrated and angry.   On the other side, the NGO staff also faced many challenges starting from welcoming the refugees from their arrival till they settled in the place that they can live with dignity.

The settlement process included having each family (5 members +/-) get registered after arrival in UNHCR registration area that was located at the entrance of the camp, then receiving such as tent plus mattresses, and finally being escorted by the community mobilizers to the places that were arranged for each family. Water plus food must be delivered in a daily basis plus other important relief items such nonfood items to keep those refugees surviving and other cares like medical attention, looking after elderlies, disabled and babies were vital as well.

On average, 100 – 200 refugees entered the camp per day, but in some days the number reached 3,000 per day. It can be imaginable the big challenging of NGOs to do their job in best image.
I’d like to bring to light the challenges of humanitarian actors like JEN and the difficulties they faced when the Syrian refugees started to enter Za’atari camp and their settlement plus many improvements happened to the camp during the last 5 years to convert this empty land to almost a town up to standard.

I’d like to appreciate and thank all humanitarian staff that they were involved and faced all challenges to keep the refugees living with dignity.

 (Water and Waste Water Network constructions)     

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JEN will be there for the most vulnerable households to keep providing the support they need.

【JEN is now accepting donations. Your help would be very much appreciated. DONATE here】

Promotion of hygiene in Zaatari Camp

As of September 2017, approximately 80,000 Syrian refugees live in Zaatari Refugee Camp. Today, maintenance of water supply and sewage infrastructure is ongoing. Such maintenance will substitute the current water supply system by water trucks and improve the living condition of refugees in the long term.

However, this construction work also produces dust and soil from digging trenches which bring unsanitary conditions in the Camp.

My name is Amal, and I work as hygiene promotor in Zaatari Camp. In this report, I will introduce our hygiene promotion activity.

The purpose of hygiene promotion activity is to prevent or decrease infectious disease by providing knowledge of hygiene to refugees who live in highly populated Zaatari Camp, where, recently the construction works are having an impact to the daily water and hygiene activities.

By conducting hygiene promotion activity in parallel with water supply and hygiene facility maintenance, we expect synergy effect with cleaned safe water and access to hygiene facilities. We carry out this activity in all areas of the Camp together with other organizations. JEN is in charge of Districts 3, 4, and 5.

Hygiene Promotors of the Syrian community (hereunder, CHP) play an important role in spreading message around hygiene as well. Syrian refugees who take up this role contribute as volunteers to community, without receiving any money for their work.

After receiving training on hygiene-related messaging, CHPs spread these messages through group sessions to people in their neighborhoods. It is their job to spread the messages in their respective areas in charge.

Today, I am trying to increase the number of CHPs so that CHP members can spread hygiene messages by themselves in JEN’s Districts. However, I am facing many challenges in recruitment, training, and maintenance of members.

During recruitment, many refugees show willingness to participate in activity, but only a few can continue working as volunteer.

In addition, there are some other challenges. Local religion considers Volunteering as good deed, but some family ban women to communicate with other refugees, making it impossible for them to participate.

Even for those people who participate in volunteer activity for long time, those who are financially in trouble resigns when they find job that pays.

Ms. Salmais one of active participants of CHP. She lives with her son and husband. She has worked 2 years as CHP. Before she participated in JEN activity, she saw that her neighbors were taking wrong hygiene actions, and felt the necessity for hygiene promotion activity.

She told us that through participation in trainings and activities of hygiene promotion, she made many new friends, improved self-confidence and knowledge.

【Women CHP conducting hygiene promotion session in her own house】

【Meeting with men CHP members in community center】

As it requires time and energy to provide hygiene training to new volunteers, the problem of resignation of volunteers is serious. Sometimes we distribute hygiene goods to CHP and participants for the purpose of motivating participants and providing compensation to CHP member’s free services.

However, when CHP member and participants start to expect to receive hygiene goods, which we are unable to distribute every time, it becomes difficult to continue activity when we have nothing to provide.

Nowadays, we are searching for other ways to spread message other than usual group session, in order to promote willingness of CHP.

For example, one CHP realized that teaching children, who are quick to act and have more time compared to adults, brings positive change to the community. Some of the CHPs who were thinking about resigning changed their mind after participating in hygiene activity for children.

We hope that this new initiatives will be solution to our challenge, and that many CHP work together with us for long time.

【CHP member carrying out hygiene promotion activity to children】

I am proud to work for JEN, which give me chance to be deeply involved in NGO activities and emergency support for refugees. In addition, my experience in working for JEN led to improvement of my skills and knowledge.

By cooperating with my team and trying to improve hygiene action and raising awareness of hygiene of people, I hope that the three sections we are in charge become a good example as cleanest of all camp.

Amal Abuown
Hygiene promotor

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JEN will be there for the most vulnerable households to keep providing the support they need.

【JEN is now accepting donations. Your help would be very much appreciated. DONATE here】

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Improvement of life through “Cash For Work”～Interview of Ms. Rasya, a Syrian refugee～

Now that we are in September in Zaatari Refugee Camp, sometimes we have cloudy days under 35 degrees Celsius, but most days are extremely hot, reaching nearly 40 degrees Celsius.

In this blog, I would like to introduce the following two topics:
1.Paid Volunteer program called “Cash For Work”
2.An interview of a community center guardwoman, as part of this program

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1.What is Cash For Work?

Cash for Work (hereunder, “CFW”) is a program in which refugees work as paid volunteers to improve environment and services of the camp, and in return, receive remuneration.

In Japan, this program was run for the rehabilitation and reconstruction support of Great East Japan Earthquake. Victims of the Earthquake who participated in this program supported local communities through restoration work. The program gathered attention as it enabled affected people’s self-reliance.

JEN’s CFW program in Zaatari camp is a variety of public services such as cleaning, guardman/womanship of JEN’s facilities, and reparation work. JEN welcomes participation of women and disabled people who generally have hard time finding jobs.

Now we will introduce interview of Ms. Rasya, a Syrian refugee who works as a guardwoman of community center.

She spoke about her life in Syria – how she sought refuge in Zaatari Camp in Jordan, the difficult early days in Camp, and some changes in her everyday life after she started working as CFW.

2.“This work gave me confidence” ～Interview of Ms. Rasya～

“My name is Rasya, I am 28 years old and I am from a village of Daraa　District in Syria.

【Ms. Rasya responding to questions of JEN staff (front of photo)】

“I was married before in Syria, had one daughter. After I got divorced with my husband, I returned to live with my family. As my daughter was little, I spent most of my time at home. I rarely left the house, just to go to the hospital and to do shopping when necessary.”

“After the civil war started, I sought refuge here, Zaatari Camp in Jordan on 26 November 2011. At that time life was very difficult, so I remember the date very well.”

“In the beginning I shared one tent with my family and daughter, a total of 10 people. We shared the bathroom and shower with other families. Clean water tank was also shared with other families, so I always had to go to the shared tank to collect water for myself, and sometimes we could not receive the amount of water we were supposed to.”

“I started working as a guard of JEN’s community center from 2nd of July this year. My shift is every morning from 8:00 to 12:00. My job includes opening and closing the gate, monitoring goods in the community center, and informing JEN staff when we keep things for other organizations. Also I clean and water plants here.”

“Before I started working, I spent my day without doing much. When I went out, it was to go to the hospital, or to receive food distribution. But through this job I gained self-confidence.”

“I can support my family financially, and I became mentally stronger as I began to think that I am supporting somebody. Before there were not many CFW program for women, but the situation is improving, for instance I was able to get this job as a guardwoman.”

“Participation to CFW has become a necessary income source for single mother family like mine.”

【Community center of JEN in District 4 where Ms. Rasya works as a guardwoman】

Through this CFW program, JEN will continue to support families having economic difficulties including households with women like Ms. Rasya and/or persons with disability.

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JEN will be there for the most vulnerable households to keep providing the support they need.

【JEN is now accepting donations. Your help would be very much appreciated. DONATE here】

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Animals in the Camp

Human are not the only one that operate and maintain the Zaatari Refugee Camp.
For example, this cat welcomes JEN staff every morning and notifies the start of work.
For example, this dog reminds us that sometimes we need a time off.
For example, this donkey teaches us that the human race cannot live alone.
The animals in the Camp cheer us up, sometimes by providing emotional support to Syrian refugees and support staff, and sometimes by working harder than anybody in the Camp.

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JEN will be there for the most vulnerable households to keep providing the support they need.

【JEN is now accepting donations. Your help would be very much appreciated. DONATE here】

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Improving living conditions

It’s only mid-August but already it’s 40 degrees celsius at Za‘atari refugee camp.

This year, JEN started providing support to improve the well-being of the most vulnerable families at Za‘atari camp.

A 3 meter x 5 meter container, “caravan” is provided to a family of 6.

The caravan is not large enough to live in, so many families add extra rooms onto the caravan, to create a kitchen and bathroom.

To use the space next to the caravan they lay cement as the ground is rocky and uneven.

However, it is difficult for many families especially those in need of nursing care, single parent families, families with many children and wheelchair users to earn the money needed to improve their living conditions. So some families live on an uneven dirt floor.

So, JEN helped 8 families improve their living conditions, if only by a little, by making cement floors for them.

Please have a look at photos of the work.

[JEN’s team happily carrying the building materials]

[Inside a house with corrugated iron walls. Blanket is mat directly over dirt floor as you can see in this photo]

[Mixing the cement]

[Quickly spreading the cement evenly over the dirt floor]

[The work is completed in one day!]

JEN will be there for the most vulnerable households to keep providing the support they need.

【JEN is now accepting donations. Your help would be very much appreciated. DONATE here】