Chad resident discusses vegetable garden, developed with seeds and equipment provided through IRD

IRD Assists Victims of the Darfur Crisis in Eastern Chad

Eastern Chad — June 11, 2007 — IRD is currently accepting cash donations for the victims of the violence in Darfur and eastern Chad. Donations will be used to support projects covering a wide range of areas such as direct food and non-food item distribution, agricultural assistance, training in animal husbandry, and nutritional support for women and children.

“With more help, we can extend our urgent relief programs to both Sudanese refugees and the people of Chad,” said Dr. Arthur B. Keys, Jr. “Permanent communities in Chad aren’t able to provide resources for the refugees, so IRD, the international community, and the world at large will have to continue to do all we can to help the victims of this ongoing tragedy.”

IRD has been working in eastern Chad since May 2005, providing assistance to the Sudanese refugees in the four camps in northeastern Chad, internally displaced populations in southeastern Chad, and local Chadians in both locations. The situation is remains challenging, since the few resources of the area are spread between many different groups of people in need.

Selected activities covered by the projects are as follows:

• Food-for-work, where laborers receive food rations for participating in road rehabilitation, water reservoir digging and other projects;
• Provision of  seeds and tools for farming;
• Rehabilitation of water systems;
• Livestock vaccinations, as well as training of para-veterinarians; and
• Supplemental feeding for children under the age of five.

IRD’s goal is to help at least 50,000 people in the region improve their access to food, provide water for themselves, their livestock and their gardens, and create jobs that will help increase family incomes.

Funding for IRD’s projects is provided in part by the Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance (OFDA), the Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration (BPRM) of the Department of State, and the United Nations World Food Programme. IRD also relies on private donations to assist people directly through its web site, www.ird.org.

IRD was founded in 1998 as a charitable, non-profit, non-governmental organization dedicated to reducing the suffering of the world’s most vulnerable groups and providing tools and resources needed to increase their self-sufficiency.

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