DR Congo
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Photo: Miguel Samper for Mercy Corps
Our strategy
Respond to the immediate needs of displaced families in eastern Congo. Help them lessen the impact of the current crisis and set the stage for recovery.
The context
Fighting between the government and various rebel groups continues in eastern Congo, this after a 1998-2003 war that killed five million people. One in ten people is displaced in the province where Mercy Corps works. Congo ranks last on the 2011 UN Human Development Index, a measure of countries’ social and economic well-being. More than 70 percent of its population lives below the poverty line.
Our work
- Emergency response: Provided temporary shelter and emergency food to displaced families during spikes in rebel fighting
- Water: Rebuilding Goma’s municipal water system to serve 400,000 people and improving sanitation in overcrowded displacement camps
- Agriculture & Food: Helping farmers grow more with new production and disease prevention techniques
- Environment: Teaching women to build and use fuel-efficient stoves
- Economic opportunity: Creating jobs to build classrooms, health centers and community farms
All stories about DR Congo
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DR Congo: Instructions September 9, 2007
Finally, some real work! Actually helping people instead of listening to their stories and driving home. Mugur has found us a niche. He’s been frantically working every angle and contact as the IDPs flooded into town this week. Being new to Congo, it’s been tough to break in.
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DR Congo: A Day in the Office September 8, 2007
Mugur came back from a security briefing at the UN with the following updates:
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DR Congo: Rain and IDPs September 7, 2007
A strange couple of days. Yesterday, Thursday, the fighting intensified. Pretty much the whole town of Sake emptied and came here, and they are still coming. Now there are some 30,000 IDPs in Goma, most up in Mugunga.
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DR Congo: Chanceline September 6, 2007
One day last week I visited the health center in Muja, a town 15 miles north of Goma, just west of the army checkpoint. It is a place of crushing poverty, even by DRC standards. Three-fourths of the children are undernourished. People earn less than a dollar a day.
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DR Congo: Questions August 23, 2007
Spent today conducting assessment surveys with Fernand, one of our Congolese staff. Basically, this means going door to door and asking people 61 questions ranging from how much money they earn and what they eat each day to where they go for health care.