Every year, the gap between rich and poor gets even wider – and it’s being fuelled by the use of tax havens. Today, 8 individuals have the same wealth as the poorest half the people on our planet. It is time to bring an end to inequality. It is time to Even it up!
For 40 years, the Quechua communities in Peru have lived with contaminated rivers, and poor health as a result of oil drilling. Teddy Guerra is leading the effort to obtain integral land rights for his community before any more concessions are given to oil companies. Read his story and sign the petition.
Millions of people are being forced to flee their homes, risking everything to escape conflict, disaster, poverty or hunger. We are working in nine of the ten top refugee source countries as well as in refugee host countries. We urgently need your help to reach people in Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and in Europe.
With no end in sight to the conflict in Syria, hundreds of thousands of people are living in desperate conditions and exposed to continuing violence. Today, half the pre-conflict population of 22 million Syrians have fled their homes and more than 13.5 million people urgently need your help.
Burundi is one of the poorest countries on the planet. With 8.1 million inhabitants in 2008, more than half the population is under 17 years old and life expectancy is only 51 years. More than a decade of wars has left the country in an extremely delicate situation, in which peace is a relative concept and insecurity persists.
Burundi depends to a large extent on international aid, which represents more than a third of the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
Oxfam has been working in Burundi since the 1990s. Our work was initially focused on humanitarian interventions, but it has been progressively shifted towards reconstruction and development.
Emergency Response
The 2015 election tensions led to weeks of violent protests across the capital and rural districts of Burundi. Ten’s of thousands of Burundians have now fled to neighboring countries, many to Tanzania and Rwanda. The political situation related to the Presidential elections (July 21st) has been having a major impact on an economy that was already weak, and as a result people’s vulnerability has increased.
Since late May 2015 Oxfam has been responding to this crisis at Kabonga’s refugee camp in Burundi and at Nyarugusu and Kagunga camps in Tanzania. We have also been working elsewhere in Burundi, in the Democratic Republic of Congo and in Rwanda. We are providing food, clean water and sanitation to refugees. We are also conducting hygiene promotion programs and have put in place mechanisms to prevent sexual and gender-based violence.
Sustainable Livelihoods
Oxfam strives to boost agricultural production to reduce food insecurity by promoting the development of value chains, particularly among women and young people. We focus on women’s rights across all areas of production to empower them through transformational leadership so they can have access to land and have a voice in the implementation of rural and agricultural development policies.
Basic Essential Services
We work with rural communities to improve access to education facilities and to drinking water and sanitation systems.
Peace and Security
We focus on humanitarian response to crisis, prevention of and preparation for natural and human-made disasters and peace building to promote social cohesion and peaceful co-existence.
The right to be heard
We strive to strengthen citizen’s critical awareness towards human rights, peace, social justice and public accountability; by enabling the understanding of their rights and responsibilities as well as their participation.
Updated: 16 September 2015
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