Joana Sampainho (ELP 2021) | Recovery Program Analyst, UNDP, Portugal

During the late summer of 2020, Sudan was affected by devastating floods in the Nile river basin, accompanied by heavy rain and flash flooding in non-Nile States. The scale and extent of last year’s seasonal flooding – reportedly the worst in over three decades – was immense: with over 875,000 people affected across all 18 States of the country. The floods impacted almost every sector of the economy while disrupting the lives and livelihoods of the Sudanese people in both rural and urban areas. 

The floods affected Sudan in a time of multiple crises and economic hardship. The secession of South Sudan in 2011 heavily impacted Sudan’s economy and led to a sharp rise in consumer and fuel prices, while civil war and ongoing conflicts in South Sudan and more recently in Ethiopia precipitated an increase in Sudan’s already large population of refugees and internally displaced persons. Nearly 1.1 Internal Displaced People (IDPs), refugees and asylum seekers have been severely affected by the recent floods, primarily due to damages faced in basic sanitation services and price inflation.(1)

East Sudan hosts one of the largest refugee population in Africa, in addition to 2.6 million (2) internally displaced population due to conflict. This region is also extremely vulnerable to climate-related events - between 2016-2019 the average number of floods affected population was over 37,000 and 20,000 in Kassala and Sennar, respectively (3). Last year’s influx of refugees from the Tigray region in Ethiopia further strained natural resources, as trees were cut for camps and cooking needs. The environmental degradation coupled with the limited capacity of the exposed population to deal with climate shocks makes emergency preparedness for response imperative. 

The East Sudan refugee population requires an emergency preparedness plan for response, which should be based on sound risk and vulnerability analysis. The plan should include contingency for providing essential services to refugees in the case of limited or no access to camps due to flooding.  Community-based response and early warning systems need to be put in place. Awareness generation related to floods is vital and should be inclusive. Special attention should be placed on the special needs of women, children, and the elderly. 

Structural measures to reduce risk in refugee camps are also important. Planting and farming in the refugee area by engaging refugee volunteers and host communities can have double dividends in terms of creating livelihoods and environmental benefits. Community facilities for refugee camps and emergency shelters should be built through a flood risk lens. Measures such as strengthening community facilities and shelter through additional material and technical know-how, creating drainage for rainwater flow, and relocating shelters away from flood prone zones will help mitigate the risk.

Sudan has an incipient national disaster risk management system. Therefore, it will be equally important to strengthen systems for preparedness, response coordination, recovery, and long-term risk mitigation across sectors at the national and sub-national levels. It should include setting up the appropriate institutional arrangements to allow the inclusion of risk reduction measures across different sector policies and plans and to create the legal framework for disaster risk management.