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The United Nations in Somalia
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP):
UNDP in Somalia seeks to promote better governance by strengthening security, enhancing democracy, and reducing poverty as measured by the Millennium Development Goals. Learn more about UNDP’s work in Somalia.
Twenty-five UN Volunteers are currently serving in Somalia, in the area of air traffic control, civil engineering, human rights, relief operations, refugee protection, food supply, and health and law. They support the efforts of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the World Food Programme (WFP), the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).
Food and Agriculture Organizations (FAO):
FAO provides regular updates on the food security and nutrition situation throughout Somalia to the international and Somali communities, through the Food Security Assessment Unit. A network of field staff monitors a range of indicators including crop production, rainfall, market information, livestock and pasture condition, and abnormal livestock movements. Assessment of nutritional status is undertaken by surveillance through Maternal Child Health (MCH) Centres and nutrition surveys.
World Health Organization (WHO):
WHO works towards polio eradication, strengthening routine immunization, controlling and reducing the prevalence of diseases, and providing essential drugs to health facilities, all of which are aimed at strengthening the health care delivery system.
WFP focuses on relief and recovery operations to drought and other natural disaster-affected areas. Selective food programs target school feeding, tuberculosis centers, HIV/AIDS patients, maternal child health systems, orphanages and other socially vulnerable groups. Recovery operations aim at social and economic infrastructure rehabilitation.
International Labor Organization (ILO):
ILO promotes economic recovery and employment creation, and it supports decentralization in Somalia. It supports local economic recovery drawing heavily on the documented experience of the ILO InFocus Programme on Crisis Response and Reconstruction (IFP/CRISIS) in other post-conflict countries to adapt and implement an economic recovery model for the Somali environment.
United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
OCHA Somalia has mobilized and coordinated an effective and principled inter-agency humanitarian response system to disasters such as drought, tsunamis, floods, inter/intraclan violence, chronic food insecurity, and environmental degradation and displacement that have heavily affected Somalia.
Civil Aviation Caretaker Authority for Somalia (CACAS):
CACAS oversees airports in Somalia and currently handles an average of 500 flights per month, transporting some 8,000 passengers. CACAS also provides airport operations training in communications, firefighting and rescue; assesses airport safety, and maintenance and rehabilitation.
United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA):
UNFPA supports projects and programs that help meet the need for family planning, safer and healthier pregnancy and childbirth (including the provision of emergency obstetric care) and the prevention of sexually-transmitted infections including HIV/AIDS. UNFPA also supports the collection and analysis of sociodemographic data in Somalia.
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR):
UNHCR focuses on durable solutions for Somali refugees in the region through voluntary repatriation of individuals wishing to return to Central and Southern Somalia. UNHCR works to help individuals reintegrate and rehabilitate where feasible, also helping in facilitating the resettlement of Somali refugees from countries of asylum while encouraging self-reliance among refugees in asylum.
United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF):
UNICEF activities in Somalia target children in health and nutrition, water supply, sanitation and hygiene and basic education. In addition, the communication, protection and participation programs have activities that cut across all program areas including: child protection, HIV/AIDS and youth development.
United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM):
UNIFEM in Somalia promotes the participation of women in development planning and in the building of social and political structures. Some of these efforts have included small grassroots enterprises that improved working conditions for women to public education campaigns and the design of new gender-sensitive laws and marketing systems.
United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO):
In collaboration with local and national partners, UNESCO assists in the development and distribution of primary school textbooks, the development of national curriculum and syllabi for technical and vocational education, and support for the assessment of examinations. UNESCO also supports civic education and radio broadcasts on peacebuilding and national reconciliation.
United Nations Department of Safety and Security (UNDSS):
The UNDSS in Somalia seeks to prevent loss of life or injury among UN staff, protect UN assets, resources and facilities, establish contingency plans for emergency security operations in Somalia, provide the UN and the humanitarian community with information on the prevalent security situation and possible threat scenarios. The UNDSS also provides UN staff and International Non-Governmental Organizations (INGOs) with security advice where appropriate, and conducts security and safety training to enable appropriate reaction to a crisis.
Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS):
UNAIDS' mission in Somalia is to lead, strengthen and support an expanded response to HIV/AIDS that includes preventing transmission of HIV, providing care and support to those already living with the virus, reducing the vulnerability of individuals and communities to HIV and alleviating the impact of the epidemic.
United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT):
UN-HABITAT’s goal in Somalia is to improve urban governance, including legal and institutional reforms, strengthening municipal governance and the role of civil society, improve urban management, including strategic planning, land management, municipal finance, delivery of basic services and local economic development, and improve the implementation of local projects in such fields as: housing, basic urban infrastructure, the upgrading of settlements for internally displaced persons, and the construction of markets and slaughterhouses.
