Reducing displacement risk in the Greater Horn of Africa: A baseline for future work

The thematic report presents the first baseline for displacement risk associated with sudden-onset disasters in the countries of the Greater Horn of Africa with the ultimate aim of reducing future displacement risk. As sudden-onset natural hazards, primarily floods, caused more than 600,000 new displacements in 2016 in the Greater Horn of Africa, this report is very timely.

The need to address the risk and impacts of disaster displacement is a global and regional policy priority. To do so, however, such risk must be measured, and governments and other agencies need a baseline against which to measure their progress. To address this need,IDMC has developed a methodology to estimate displacement risk associated with sudden-onset natural hazards, and the result is the first fully probabilistic assessment of the phenomenon for the Greater Horn of Africa.

Displacement in the Greater Horn of Africa is highly complex because a range of interlinked triggers and drivers are at play. Disasters increase competition for land and resources, which can lead to violence and conflict. In turn, this can also increase communities’ vulnerability to the impacts of natural hazards. Furthermore, the region is among those worst affected by the multiple effects of climate change including above average temperature, excessive or insufficient rainfall, desertification and environmental degradation.