Protection risks for internally displaced persons (IDPs) are heightened in the Port-au-Prince metropolitan area and recent data from the Displacement Tracking Matrix (DTM) of the International Organization for Migration (IOM) shows that almost half of the displaced people now live in an improvised site, whereas a few months ago there were only a quarter.

Indeed, as the crisis drags on, the capacity of communities to host displaced people is eroding, exposing displaced populations to greater protection risks, such as gender-based, communal and sexual violence, discrimination and abuse.

In order to regularly inform the authorities and other partners on the situation of displacement in Haiti, the General Directorate of Civil Protection (DGPC) and the DTM of the IOM have carried out mobility monitoring assessments to collect and update update information on the number, profiles and needs of IDPs in the country. According to the latest assessments in June 2023, instability and insecurity have caused the displacement of nearly 200,000 Haitians in the country, of which 131,000 are displaced inside the metropolitan area of Port-au-Prince alone.

Yakin Mwanza, in charge of IOM's DTM program in Haiti, pointed out that “people displaced in sites live in precarious conditions. More than half of the sites have no latrines. Where latrines are available, they often do not meet minimum hygiene standards. This situation is very worrying considering the cholera epidemic in the country.”

Although the displaced people are mainly concentrated in the metropolitan area, other departments are also affected. DTM data show that the Center and Artibonite departments host 29,000 and 22,000 displaced persons respectively. On the other hand, Artibonite is the second zone of the country, after the ZMPP, where incidents of insecurity are the most frequent. Thus, 3 out of 4 displaced persons in the Artibonite are from other localities in the same department, while the others come from the metropolitan area,” said Yakin Mwanza.

Despite these challenges, IOM and its partners continue to provide protection services and humanitarian assistance to displaced persons and returning migrants, including through the provision of food, water, primary health care, psychosocial support, shelters, and through the distribution of personal hygiene items, solar lamps, cooking utensils and other basic necessities.

The assistance provided by IOM was made possible through financial support from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Bureau of Humanitarian Affairs (BHA), Directorate General for European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (DG ECHO), Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA), Global Affairs Canada and the United Kingdom Home Office.

HL/ HaitiLibre