General data

ACF France's Mission

Launch date: 2005 (Bangui)
Local staff : 112
Expatriates : 15

Intervention places:

• BANGUI
• BERBERATI
• BOSSANGOA
• MARKOUNDA

Types of intervention:

• Nutrition and Health
• Water, Sanitation and Hygiene

Country key figures

Population : 4,2 millions inhabitants (2010)

Beneficiaries: 67 300
Life expectancy : 47,7 years (2010)
Human Development Indicator :159/169 (2010)
GDP/inhabitant : 454$ US (2009)

Context

Vast country (622 984 km²) and sparsely populated (4,2 millions inhabitants and 6/km²), Central African republic is an enclosed territory within a particularly volatile sub-region, on political and security points of view.

It is a fragile country, characterized by the absence of Central African State and authorities in all its domains of responsability; this institutional incapacity entailed that authorities started to be called "Ghost State".

The succession of politico-military crises, the pale public finances and generalized corruption which affects all levels of the state and public companies, finished the bankruptcy of this State. The four traditionally lucrative sectors , which are diamond, wood, cotton and breeding (in the North) already stricken because of insecurity and bad governance were particularly touched by the world economic crisis of 2008-2009.

Central African Republic is a country in state of chronic vulnerability whose situation has worsened year by year for more than 40 years. About 70 % of the population lives below poverty line. The humanitarian crisis peaked with the armed conflicts of 2002 and 2003 during the seizure of power by François Bozize's coup, who was finally elected president in March 2005. From this date, opposit armed groups appeared in North regions, and were in violent confrontation with the regular army, provoking massve movements of population. Chased away from their villages, 98 000 people fled to take refuge in Chad, Sudan or Cameroon. 190 000 others took refuge into the bush or joined big cities. Movements of return into original villages were observed in 2009 but remain precarious due to people's expactation to have a strong and reassuring political message.

Central African Republic is an enclosed territory which has one part escaping from State control. If 2010 was characterized by a relative stability in areas under control of APRD rebel forces, the degradation of the security situation in the East of the country became widespread.

Finally, problems of security linked to foreign armed groups( FPR, Chadian Army, LRA), and to the conflict with rebel (APRD, UFDR, CPJP, FDPC) of which some remain active, are still not solved.

The conflicts between transhumants and farmers are recurring in CAR and without real will of negociations. The country fits into a fragile regional context marked by series of elections programmed for 2011.

ACF in CAR

Intervention axes of the mission:

• Accompany the return and strengthen the livelihood of populations moved by the conflicts while developing medium and long-terms objectives.
• Increase capacities of resilience towards shocks of Central African populations by putting the bases of a local development.
• Introduce a strategy to fight social banishment and insalubrity in urban areas of Bangui.
• Increase the ability to react, the efficiency as well as ACF's capacity to react to humanitarian emergencies in the country.

Funding

• ACF
• UNICEF
• ECHO
• PNUD
• HCR
• WFP
• AECI-ACCD
• Water Agency of Rhin Meuse.