Refugees and conflict-affected people: Integrating displaced communities into food systems

Abstract

Humanitarian interventions that have the greatest likelihood of success involve investing in local agrifood systems and including conflict-affected people in strategies for building, reviving, or strengthening these systems.
KEY FINDINGS
- More than half of all undernourished people live in countries affected by conflict.
- Food insecurity and dispossession of agricultural assets can both trigger and result from civil strife.
- Most conflict-affected countries are overwhelmingly rural, and rural populations are more vulnerable to climate shocks that often compound conflict situations.
- Refugee host countries must often decide whether to focus responses on preparing affected populations to return home or helping them become economically self-reliant.
- Integrating conflict-affected people into food systems— either in their new homes or the places they fled—can help them rebuild their lives.