South Sudan Humanitarian Crisis

• Approximately 67% of South Sudan’s population lives at the international poverty line, and the World Bank says, “GDP per-capita growth suggest that extreme poverty will likely continue to increase, reaching 73% of the population by 2024.” The inflation rate for consumer prices in South Sudan moved over the past 12 years between -0.1% and 380%.
• About 6.6 million people, or over half of South Sudan’s population (54%), are experiencing high levels of acute food insecurity. High levels of food insecurity are likely to remain due to the impact of flooding and drought on livelihoods, persistent conflict, and reduced funding.
• Since the outbreak of fighting in Sudan on April 15, 2023, there’s been an influx of people fleeing the country with 279,628 individuals registered in South Sudan as of Sept. 21, and more people expected to arrive as the fighting continues.
• One million people have been affected by four consecutive years of flooding that have submerged an area larger than Denmark.
• To address the most critical needs of 6.8 million people, the 2023 HRP will require $1.7 billion and “only timely and at-scale funding will enable us to respond to people’s needs.”
• South Sudan’s 2023 Regional Refugee Response Plan requires $1.33 billion to meet the critical needs of more than 2.2 million refugees and asylum seekers and 1.89 million members of their hosting communities.
• As of Aug. 31, 2023, there were 2,334,313 South Sudanese refugees hosted in neighboring countries, with Uganda hosting 38% (893,866) of the total figure.

South Sudan remains one of the least peaceful countries in the world, according to the 2021 Global Peace Index. The economic cost of the country’s violence is estimated at 42.1% of the total gross domestic product, which is second only to Syria globally.

Exacerbating the humanitarian situation in South Sudan is the fighting that erupted in neighboring Sudan in mid-April between the Sudanese Armed Forces and Rapid Support Forces. As of Sept. 21, 279,628 individuals were registered in South Sudan. The majority are South Sudanese returnees who had been residing in Sudan.

Around 80% of people fleeing to South Sudan pass through the border area of Joda/Renk, where the humanitarian situation is dire. The Renk Transit Centre was designed to accommodate a couple thousand people but around 12,000 are estimated to be staying there now.

In May 2023, non-government organizations (NGO) in South Sudan appealed for additional funding to meet the increasing needs due to the Sudan conflict. UNOCHA issued a statement in July 2023 calling for urgent funding “to ensure continued support for onward transportation for people fleeing the Sudan conflict to South Sudan.”

On May 4, the UN and its partners launched an Emergency Response Plan to support people fleeing the conflict in neighboring Sudan. The plan appeals for $96 million to assist the people arriving in South Sudan. Nicholas Haysom, the UN envoy for South Sudan, told the UN Security Council in June 2023 the humanitarian, economic and political impacts of the Sudanese fighting are exacerbating “the existing triggers and drivers of conflict” in South Sudan, and are “complicating an already tenuous security situation across the country.”

South Sudan’s latest peace agreement, the Revitalized Agreement on the Resolution of Conflict in South Sudan, was signed in 2018. The agreement led to a fragile truce and resulted in the formation of the Transitional Government of National Unity in February 2020.

Although hostility between the government and the main opposition has decreased, the power-sharing logic of the peace agreement may be contributing to ongoing violence in the country rather than producing lasting peace.

The UN is concerned that South Sudan’s Transitional Government may not meet its critical benchmarks. In July 2022, the U.S. ended assistance for peace process monitoring mechanisms saying South Sudan’s leaders have shown “a lack of political will necessary to implement critical reforms.”

In August 2022, South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir announced the country’s transitional government would remain in power for another two years, delaying elections that were scheduled for December. The U.S., Britain and Norway have played key roles in mediating the peace process and expressed reservations about the extension.

In October 2022, members of the UN Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan said progress on the 2018 peace agreement has been extremely slow and called for urgent action to save lives. In March 2023, President Kiir appointed a member of his own party as defense minister. The move breaches part of the peace deal in which the position should be selected by the party of First Vice President and opposition leader, Riek Machar.

Yasmin Sooka, Chairperson of the UN Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan, warned UN-appointed human rights experts in September 2022 that the international community needs to pay more attention to the escalating violence at a local level all across the country.

Amnesty International documented potential war crimes and other violations during the fighting in Western Equatoria in 2021. The various forms of violence threaten and undermine people’s physical and mental well-being.

An Amnesty International report released in May 2022 reveals how conflict-related sexual violence is ongoing in the country and how guns are used to facilitate sexual violence. In September 2022, a UN human rights team said incidents of rape had become so common in South Sudan that many women no longer report repeated sexual attacks. Rape victims lack access to medical and trauma care. An investigation by The New Humanitarian and Al Jazeera published in September 2022 found that reports of sexual abuse by aid workers at an UN-run camp in the country have continued and recently increased.

According to ACAPS analysis, humanitarian access remains highly constrained and violence against humanitarian workers is ongoing. Three aid workers were killed on duty in September 2022 alone. South Sudan continues to be one of the most dangerous places for aid workers, with nine humanitarian workers killed in 2022. In 2023, three humanitarian workers killed in January 2023 and two were shot and killed in September 2023.

South Sudan is facing its worst flooding in decades. Four consecutive years of record-breaking rains and floods covered two-thirds of the country and left people without food or land to cultivate. The devastating flooding damaged shelters and schools, destroyed crops and household goods, reduced access to safe water and hindered humanitarian access.

Hundreds of thousands of people in Bentiu, a northern city, were living beneath the water line, only protected by earthen dykes that require constant maintenance. As of Oct. 28, 2022, over 1 million people were verified as affected by torrential rain and flooding in 36 counties across South Sudan. In 2023, parts of South Sudan are expected to experience severe flooding.

December to February are typically the driest months for South Sudan, when the rivers subside and the Sudd wetlands air out. The water from the previous floods is not receding before the next rains come. Dr. Liz Stephens, professor in climate risks and resilience at the University of Reading, said, “It will certainly take years for the floods from 2021 to recede, because the land is disconnected from the main river, so floodwaters have to evaporate rather than drain away.”

The effects of the flooding are severe and broad. According to the international NGO CARE, the worsening flooding situation threatened an already fragile health system in South Sudan. In 2021, the flooding destroyed 161,055 acres (65,177 hectares) of agricultural land and killed 795,558 livestock. Around 835,000 people in 33 out of 78 counties in eight states were affected by flooding between May and December 2021.

According to UNOCHA in June 2023, “These recurring floods have worsened an already dire situation, leaving people without food and viable land for cultivation. The same states affected by severe flooding are now receiving refugees and returnees from Sudan, further straining the capacity to respond.”

In August 2023, the southern side of Renk experienced localized flooding, which displaced an estimated 1,750 people in Renk town and significantly affected the surrounding areas.

Many people who lost their 2021 harvest lost their livestock due to diseases caused by animals grazing on flooded fields. Collecting and eating plants is one coping strategy people have used. Thousands of people are being forced to move, perhaps permanently, from their traditional lands. With South Sudan already experiencing ethnic tensions and subnational conflict over resources, large scale displacements caused by flooding are likely to exacerbate the situation as people move into new lands.

In February 2023, South Sudan’s Minister of Petroleum said the country’s oil production dropped to 140,000 barrels per day from 160,000 barrels per day in 2022 due to heavy flooding in the northern oil fields. Oil production, along with agriculture, is the most important sector of South Sudan’s economy, with oil contributing 90% of revenue, according to the World Bank.

Critical drivers of displacement in South Sudan are conflict, persistent poverty, food insecurity and flooding. As of October 2022, there were more than 2.2 million IDPs in South Sudan, and more than 2.3 million South Sudanese are refugees in neighboring countries as of July 2023. The South Sudanese refugee crisis remains the largest in Africa.

Many displaced people have been forced to relocate multiple times to seek better living conditions or flee violence. Women, girls and people with disabilities are at risk of sexual violence, both inside displacement sites and when collecting fuel or food in surrounding areas.

A macroeconomic crisis, linked to a decade of conflict, is a driver of South Sudan’s humanitarian crisis and contributes to displacement. The 2023 Global Report on Food Crises highlighted other drivers of the crisis, including very high staple food prices that are a result of insufficient domestic food supplies; low foreign currency reserves and the weak national currency; high fuel prices; and reduced imports from neighboring Uganda. These factors result in limited access to livelihoods, lack of agricultural opportunities and continued insecurity, which forces people to flee their homes in search of safety and food assistance.

According to South Sudan’s 2023 Regional Refugee Response Plan (RRRP), “Some of the vulnerabilities and risk stem from exposure to endemic violence and the impact of climate chocks in the country of origin and others are magnified by prolonged displacement in situations where the needs outstrip the available resources for assistance, compounded by environments not conducive to self-reliance.”

The refugee crisis is a children’s crisis; children between the ages of 0-17 make up over 50% of the population, according to the 2023 RRRP. Refugee children face particular risks, including child labor, abduction and exposure to being trafficked.

Of the five neighboring countries hosting South Sudanese refugees, Uganda hosts the most. The majority of refugees are situated in remote and economically underserved areas. Host communities are often in an unstable socioeconomic situation themselves, and new refugees’ arrival could further exacerbate hardship.

The South Sudan 2023 HRP says, “Two-thirds of South Sudan’s population are affected by the precarious food security situation, making the country one of the worst food insecurity emergencies in the world.”

The Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET) said in September 2023, “Crisis (IPC Phase 3) and Emergency (IPC Phase 4) outcomes persist across South Sudan despite the start of the green harvest and some stabilization in cereal prices in unimodal areas, albeit at above-average levels. This persistence is driven by ongoing sporadic conflict, underlying poor macro-economic conditions, limited income-generating opportunities, slow livelihood recovery prospects, and localized poor harvests.”

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the WFP identified South Sudan as one of eight countries or regions at the highest level of concern regarding levels of acute food insecurity in their June to November 2023 outlook.

The report says, “The eruption of armed conflict in the Sudan in April 2023 is likely to have significant ramifications for its neighbouring countries, in particular large population movements and increasing levels of acute food insecurity among displaced and returning populations, and host communities across several regions.”

The combined effects of devastating flooding, linked to climate change, and armed conflict have reduced agricultural production, led to a loss of livelihoods and destroyed household assets. In their January 2023 key message update, FEWS NET said, “South Sudan continues to face very high levels of acute food insecurity indicative of Crisis (IPC Phase 3) or worse outcomes, with Emergency (IPC Phase 4) outcomes persisting in the worst conflict- and/or flood-affected areas.”

According to Oxfam research published in May 2022, “More than 80% of the respondents in the study pointed to the intercommunal conflicts and the recurring floods that have hit the region over the past three years as being the major drivers of the food security crisis.” Traditional sources of livelihoods for women have been depleted which contributed to an increase in gender inequality.

Adeyinka Badejo, WFP acting country director in South Sudan, said in April 2022, “Until conflict is addressed, we will continue to see these numbers increase because what it means is that people do not have safe access to their lands to cultivate.”