V. Humanitarian Crisis in Dadaab's Camps

The services in Dadaab are well below any minimum standards. There are huge needs in all sectors and we don't have the money to do anything about it. We can't even go look for the most vulnerable refugees because when we find them, we can't help them. It's overwhelming. We have asked that this situation be officially declared an emergency but that hasn't happened.[72]

-Aid worker in Dadaab refugee camp.

The huge 2008 increase in Somali refugees entering Kenya has placed a massive strain on Dadaab's refugee camps.[73] Although the camps' infrastructure was designed for 90,000 people, by end February 2009 the camps held just over 255,000 registered refugees who lacked just over 40,000 shelters. At the end of August 2008, the final camp was declared full. Between then and the end of February 2009, just over 35,144 registered new arrivals have received no shelter and are forced to live in cramped conditions with relatives or strangers. Because only limited additional land (for up to 50,000 refugees) has been promised so far, and because it will take at least until July or August 2009 to build a new camp, the number of refugees without any or adequate shelter will dramatically increase in 2009. Local politicians and community leaders demand that impoverished local Kenyans benefit more from aid agencies' presence in Dadaab before new land will be provided to the refugees. A registration crisis throughout much of 2008 has meant thousands of unregistered refugees have waited weeks, and in some cases months, to receive food, and struggle to access water and healthcare.

Severely under-funded even before some 80,000 new refugees registered in Dadaab's camps in 2007 and 2008, aid agencies working in the camps urgently need additional funding for their work. Acute malnutrition, including amongst under-fives and infants, stands at 13 percent,[74] and many refugees are forced to sell food to buy essential items such as firewood and basic household goods. Dadaab's crumbling water system officially provides only 16 liters per person per day-four liters below the absolute minimum required-and due to a number of factors the true amount is almost certainly far less. Sanitation conditions are appalling: just over 36,000 latrines are needed to reach minimum standards,[75] women and children (half the camps' population) cannot use the latrines, and a recent assessment by Oxfam concluded that the situation is conducive to a public health emergency. Healthcare teams-under-staffed and missing basic drugs-cannot cope with growing chronic needs and crude, maternal, infant, and under-five mortality rates are all far below international standards.

Overcrowding

"A whole new camp has walked in this year."[76]

Land shortage

When Dadaab's three camps first opened in 1991/2, their infrastructure-water piping, food distribution centers, and healthcare centers-was designed to accommodate 90,000 people. [77] By end 2005, the total number of refugees in the camps stood at 127,000; by February 2009 the number had doubled to just over 255,000. [78] 61,761 new refugees arrived in 2008 alone, a growth of 36 percent, and a further 14,009 refugees arrived in January and February 2009. [79] Based on an estimate of at least 5,000 new refugees per month, Dadaab's camps are projected to house at least 300,000 mainly Somali refugees by the end of 2009, though UNHCR estimates this number could rise to as many as 360,000. [80]

Over the years, the camps slowly expanded. [81] But in early 2008 local government representatives, the Dadaab (Kenyan) host community, and the Member of Parliament (MP) for Lagdera constituency, Farah Maalim, refused permission for the camps to be extended further. [82] They argued that refugees were destroying the local environment (by felling trees, cutting bush, and particularly by grazing livestock on pastoralist land) and that the host community was not benefiting enough from the UN and NGO presence in terms of economic development and employment opportunities, especially for unskilled labor. [83] In response to this pressure, the last plot of available land was distributed on August 20, 2008 and a week later UNHCR declared all three camps full. [84]

Since then new arrivals have not been given plots of land, receive no shelter materials, and have no choice but to settle with relatives or strangers on existing plots of land. Between August 20, 2008, and February 28, 2009, officially 35,144 new refugees arrived in Dadaab, and are now squatting with refugees who were living on plots of land that were already too small for their needs. [85] With predictions that at least another 50,000 refugees will arrive from Somalia in 2009, the need for new land is urgent.

In light of recent UNHCR reports that "the lack of shelter and the limited police presence has made it difficult to prevent sexual violence in the camp[s]," the urgency is even greater. [86]

Stalled negotiations and limited progress on land for a fourth camp and the need for a fifth camp

Since some time in 2007, UNHCR has unilaterally and-until February 2009-unsuccessfully tried to negotiate an agreement for new land for a fourth camp to house new arrivals. [87]

Initially, UNHCR tried to negotiate for land in the Lagdera constituency (represented by Farah Maalim, MP), but these negotiations soon stalled after the local host community demanded increased development aid and employment opportunities in return for an agreement. [88]

In 2008, UNHCR identified land located about 15 kilometers to the south east of Dadaab town, near the town of Kambi Oss. [89] The land is located in Fafi constituency represented by Alan Sugow, MP. Between September 2008 and January 2009, the negotiations stalled after the host community and its MP asked UNHCR to create a new UNHCR sub-office in the town of Alin Jugor, close to Kambi Oss, that would manage the new camp and one of the three old camps (Hagadera) which is also located in Fafi constituency. [90]

However, following a verbal agreement between UNHCR and the local community, in early February 2009 UNHCR announced that Kenya's prime minister had committed to providing land in Fafi District for a fourth camp near Dadaab, capable of sheltering up to 50,000 refugees to help decongest the existing camps. [91] At the end of February 2009, UNHCR told Human Rights Watch that it believed that the land could in fact hold 120,000 refugees, and that camps built on the land could be used to decongest the existing camps or shelter new arrivals. [92] However, Adan Sugow, the MP representing the local Kenyan community living near the new land, stated that in accordance with UNHCR's initial announcement, the agreement relates to land for a maximum of 50,000 refugees of whom 30,000 should be transferred from Hagadera camp and a further 20,000 from Dagahaley and Ifo camps. [93] Any additional land-either for more relocations to help further decongest the existing camps or for new arrivals in 2009 from Somalia-will have to be negotiated in a separate agreement. [94] In March 2009, UNHCR stated that the land for the 50,000 refugees had been "tentatively allocated," that it was "undergoing vetting by local councillors, who have indicated their support with many conditions including the request that the entire [camp] be fenced off," and that "other conditions remain ambiguous." [95]

Although the February 2009 agreement is a welcome development, the land shortage crisis in Dadaab's camps is set to get far worse before a sustainable solution is found. A conservative estimate of the number of refugees living in Dadaab's three camps by mid-2009 is 280,000. [96] If 50,000 refugees were then to be transferred to a fourth camp in July 2009, at least 230,000 refugees-far in excess of the camps' capacity-would remain in the existing three camps and, together with the new fourth camp, would have to take in new refugees arriving after June 2009.

These statistics speak for themselves; even if 50,000 refugees are transferred in mid-2009, additional land is needed to house a further 100,000 refugees to accommodate new arrivals and reduce the number of refugees in Dadaab's existing three camps to 150,000. [97] Proper contingency planning-reflecting UNHCR's estimate of a possible 120,000 Somali refugees arriving in Dadaab by the end of 2009-would require land capable of housing even beyond that number.

The need for the United Nations Country Team (UNCT) to step in

In its attempt to lease more land, UNHCR has faced resistance from two different host communities because they feel they have not sufficiently benefited in development terms from almost 20 years of UN and NGO presence in the area. The local Kenyan community in Fafi District, where limited new land was granted in early February 2009, has made it clear that any further agreements must involve environmentally sustainable camps and development benefits for local residents. [98] According to UNDP, North Eastern Province (where Dadaab's camps are located) is one of the poorest areas of Kenya. [99]

On November 4, 2008, UNHCR for the first time asked the UNCT for assistance in helping UNHCR secure more land. [100] However, between then and the time of writing, UNHCR's initiatives have been limited to cooperation with its two UN agency partners working in Dadaab's camps (UNICEF and WHO), neither of whom are mandated to take the lead on broad development or environmental issues. [101] UNHCR appears to have taken no proactive steps with the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP). [102] In March 2009, UNHCR stated it would "work with host communities to initiate development projects … to help improve relations between the host communities … and refugees." [103]

Human Rights Watch believes UNHCR should urgently ask the Humanitarian Coordinator (HC), UNDP, and UNEP to meet with five Kenyan Ministries-Immigration and Registration of Persons, Land, Planning and National Development, Development of Northern Kenya and Other Arid Areas, and Special Programmes-to adopt a joint approach for negotiations with local community representatives from Lagdera and Fafi constituencies. [104] The Humanitarian Coordinator should lead these discussions on behalf of all UN agencies involved, as UNHCR has neither the expertise nor the resources to do so. By assuring the local community that meaningful development initiatives will be undertaken by UNDP and UNEP in conjunction with the Kenyan authorities, the discussions should separate the short-term emergency issue of securing more land for at least two more camps from the longer-term development issues.

Possible transfer of refugees from Dadaab to Kakuma

In addition to seeking land for new camps to help decongest Dadaab's existing camps, shelter new arrivals, and thereby ease Dadaab's humanitarian crisis, UNHCR has recently considered the idea of transferring some refugees to Kakuma refugee camp south of Kenya's border with Sudan.

During the first days of 2009, the Kenyan authorities informed UNHCR that due to "mounting security concerns," the Kenyan authorities had decided that " no land will be made available for new camps in North Eastern Province ." [105] Two days later, the Ministry of State for Immigration and Registration of Persons wrote to UNHCR giving the go-ahead for the transfer of 50,000 refugees from Dadaab to Kakuma camp, 1,798 kilometers from Dadaab by road. [106]

In November 2007 and July 2008, around 2,000 refugees were transferred from Dadaab to Kakuma at an estimated cost of at least US$600,000 ($300 per person) and possibly as high as $1,250,000 ($500 per person). [107] The journey from Dadaab to Kakuma takes three days and two nights. [108] Based on these figures, the cost of transferring 50,000 refugees would be between $15 million and $25 million, more than UNHCR's entire yearly budget for Dadaab's in 2007 and 2008.

As a result of these high costs and of the Kenyan authorities' commitment in early February 2009 to provide UNHCR with land for a fourth camp near Dadaab, UNHCR is now planning to transfer only around 10,000 refugees to Kakuma. [109]

Registration Crisis

In the second half of 2008, UNHCR faced a registration crisis in Dadaab. In December 2008, UNHCR found additional resources to try to improve registration coverage. Given UNHCR's planning projections for continuing high rates of refugee arrivals in 2009, UNHCR needs to maintain and improve its registration capacity in all three camps to prevent a repeat of the 2008 crisis. [110]

Between May and December 2008, at least three factors contributed to possibly thousands of new refugees not being registered: first, the January 2007 border closure and the related closure of UNHCR's transit center in Liboi which had previously ensured everyone was registered on arrival in Kenya; second, UNHCR's May 2008 decision to register new arrivals in only one camp, which led to particular problems for refugees arriving in the other two camps, both significant distances away; [111] third, difficulties new arrivals had in getting past corrupt Kenyan private security guards at the gates to UNHCR's compounds who demanded bribes of anything between K Sh 500 and 2000 ($6 – 24). [112]

Those not registered faced numerous assistance problems. Unregistered people did not get food rations.  Although they should have had free access to water, they did not (and were forced to beg from and share with others).  Many had difficulties in accessing healthcare because-contrary to official UNHCR and NGO policy-they were turned away for not having food ration cards, the only evidence of registration. Many registered refugees shared their food, water, and shelter with the unregistered, leading to a reduction in those goods for registered refugees.

The registration system

On May 31, 2008, Ifo and Hagadera camps were declared full and registration continued only in Dagahaley camp to encourage all new arrivals to settle there. But, on August 28, 2008, Dagahaley was also declared full. [113] Given that all camps were full and that new refugees were arriving and settling in all of them, UNHCR should then have re-started registration in all camps. However, this did not happen due to a combination of the extremely high number of new arrivals in July (7,383) and August (8,325) 2008, and UNHCR's lack of registration resources, which forced it to remain in one location. [114]

In October 2008, Human Rights Watch spoke to refugees who said they had tried and failed for weeks and at times months to get registered, which meant they and their families received no food, had to beg for access to water, and were in many cases denied access to healthcare.[115] The following story, of a 40-year-old man living under a tree at the back of UNHCR's compound in Dagahaley camp, is typical of many similar stories Human Rights Watch collected in the space of a few days:

I arrived with my wife and six children almost exactly three months ago and we were only properly registered three days ago. So we are supposed to get our first food in 10 days time. All this time, we have lived under this tree-under the sky-and have begged for food from other refugees. When we try to get water inside the camp, the refugees chase us away from the water taps. They say we don't live in their part of the camp so we are not allowed to have their water. I know so many other new refugees here who spend all day trying to find water for their children.[116]

Based on dozens of similar testimonies collected in the space of a few days-including testimony collected in one hour from heads of households representing 180 adults and children in a randomly selected area of one of the camps-Human Rights Watch believes that in the months leading up to October 2008, thousands of refugees faced similar delays in registration.[117]

Refugees gave a number of reasons why they could not be registered. [118] First, refugees in Hagadera and Ifo camps-a 56 kilometer and 20 kilometer return journey from Dagahaley camp, respectively-said that they had tried to get registered once or twice, but that it was too expensive or too far to continue to make the journey and that they had given up trying. Human Rights Watch spoke to a refugee who said that she had met refugees in the Somali border town of Doble who said that they had been to Dadaab, but were returning to Mogadishu because they had been unable to get registered. [119] Others said they had heard from other refugees about the registration difficulties they had faced so they did not even try.

Second, refugees from all camps said that UNHCR turned them away because on some days it said it did not have the capacity to process everyone. Finally, many refugees said they could not afford to pay the bribes demanded by Armed Group Kenya security guards which UNHCR employs at its gates. In October 2008, UNHCR in Dadaab told Human Right s Watch that they were aware of reports that the guards at their gates had taken money from refugees and that earlier in the year they had called a meeting to remind the guards that they were subject to a Code of Conduct.[120] In January 2009, two Armed Group Kenya Guards were suspended pending investigations into alleged misconduct.[121]

In December 2008, UNHCR added four clerks to its team of 15 registration clerks and in early 2009 sought to add a further seven to help register new arrivals and deal with all other registration issues in the camps. [122] In December 2008 and January 2009, UNHCR began registering refugees in a single stage (in place of the previous two-stage process [123] ), thereby ensuring that new arrivals would immediately receive their food ration card and no longer have to wait weeks or months to get food. The registration team also rotated on a weekly basis between all three camps to ensure that new arrivals in Ifo and Hagadera did not have to travel to Dagahaley to get registered. [124]

Until a new camp is ready to take in new arrivals from Somalia, UNHCR needs to continue to register all new arrivals in all three camps to avoid a re-run of the 2008 registration crisis.

Humanitarian assistance crisis [125]

"Working here is so frustrating. The needs are overwhelming. We have a crisis of everything: space, water, sanitation and food."[126]

The humanitarian situation in Dadaab's camps is well below minimum required standards. Despite registered refugees receiving 2,100 kilocalories per day, a number of factors have led to food shortages, and by mid-2008 acute malnutrition stood at 13 percent. Refugees officially receive 16 liters of water per day each, four liters below the absolute minimum required under international aid standards, but for numerous reasons the actual quantity is likely to be even well below this figure. As of the end of February 2009, 40,271 shelters and 36,271 latrines were needed to bring the camp up to minimum standards. In March 2009, Oxfam concluded that minimum standards of access, design, and use of toilets are not being met and that the situation in the camps was conducive to a public health emergency. Healthcare teams are not able to address chronic health issues and are severely under-staffed to deal with the needs of the camps' rapidly growing population.

Food

The camps face a bad nutritional situation. According to UNHCR, by mid-2008 acute malnutrition stood at 13 percent, [127] and at the end of 2008 UNICEF faced the possibility of cutting its therapeutic feeding activities due to funding constraints. [128] In March 2009, UNHCR confirmed that the level of malnutrition among under-fives was "elevated" and remained below international standards. [129] The World Food Program (WFP) states that all registered refugees are given the minimum amount of food (2,100 kcal per day) required under the SPHERE Standards. [130] But at least two factors lead Human Rights Watch to believe that the average intake is well below this level.

First, refugees sell their rations to purchase shelter (which is no longer available from UNHCR since the last camp was declared full in August 2008), as well as essential non-food items such as wood (for fuel and shelter) and basic household items. [131] Second, refugees who have been in the camps for some time told Human Rights Watch that they share everything they have-including food-with new arrivals who cannot get registered. With a new UNHCR registration strategy in place since December 2008, this problem will hopefully be reduced.

Water

The camps' 17-year-old water system is in very poor repair and running at full capacity and "with a lot of effort" to ensure that officially all registered refugees receive 16 liters of water per day. [132] This is four liters below the absolute minimum of 20 liters required under international standards. [133] For at least four reasons, the figure of 16 liters is likely to be an overestimate of the true amount of water consumed by the average registered refugee in Dadaab.

First, it ignores large quantities of water used for livelihood activities such as providing livestock with water, brick-making, and large canteens using up to 200 liters of water per day to make ice for freezers to cool drinks. [134] Second, it ignores the thousands of unregistered refugees who beg registered refugees for water, which means the average consumption rate has decreased. [135]

Third, a recent assessment by Oxfam concluded that a number of factors relating to water distribution points-"volunteers" at tap stands charging refugees for water, insufficient new tap stands to cope with huge overcrowding in certain areas, low water pressure-means that many refugees have little or no access to water. [136] Finally, Dadaab's water system can maintain the average refugee's water intake despite the constant increase in refugees, but only by pumping more water (which at some point will require the use of more powerful pumps) and by increasing rehabilitation work on the water system's piping that aims to reduce leakage and to install larger pipes that increase the rate of water flow. [137] Although there is no way of measuring whether agencies' attempts to keep up with these mechanical and logistical challenges are enough to meet the increased needs of the camps' rapidly growing population, the system is running at full capacity. Without major investment it will inevitably be unable to cope. [138]

CARE told Human Rights Watch that a major pipe breach or the failure of one of the camps' 17 bore holes could lead to a serious water crisis in the camps. [139] In March 2009, UNHCR estimated that five new boreholes were needed to meet the demands of the camps' mushrooming population. [140]

Shelter

Even before the influx of at least 61,000 new refugees in 2008, Dadaab's refugees faced a massive shortage in adequate shelter with most refugees living in tiny makeshift shelters made of sticks and plastic sheeting. According to the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) - Dadaab's lead shelter and sanitation agency since mid-2007 - by the end of 2007, Dadaab's 171,870 refugees lacked some 25,000 shelters and an additional shelter would be needed for every five new refugees arriving in 2008. [141] By the end of February 2009, UNHCR had registered an additional 76,356 new arrivals (who required 15,271 shelters), bringing the total shelter gap at the end of February 2009 to 40,271 shelters.

As noted above, two of the camps were officially declared full at the end of May 2008 and the last piece of land was handed out in the third camp on August 20, 2008. Between then and the end of February 2009, at least 35,144 new refugees arrived in Dadaab, none of whom received land or shelter materials.

In October 2008, Human Rights Watch interviewed dozens of these new arrivals who had been in the camps for weeks or months but who were still living in appalling conditions under trees and bushes. They included very young children, the sick (including physically and mentally handicapped children), and the elderly. The most visible, maybe in their hundreds, were camped on land at the back of UNHCR's compound in Dagahaley camp, but the vast majority without land simply disappeared into the sprawling camps. In one case, Human Rights Watch found a young woman and her physically and mentally handicapped seven-year-old daughter who had been living for 13 weeks under a tree with nothing but a single mattress and a piece of cloth hung above their heads to provide a small amount of additional shade. [142]

Other newly arrived refugees, slightly more fortunate, found longer-term camp residents who had opened their already overcrowded shelters and plots to accommodate them-sometimes as many as 20 adults and children, [143] many of whom sleep out in the open at night. Human Rights Watch spoke with a 34-year-old woman with seven children. In hosting two other women and their six children who had arrived three weeks before and in sharing everything she had, her story was typical of many others:

I have one small hut with one room, where the nine younger children sleep. There is not enough room for the rest of us. So the older four children and the three of us, the mothers, we sleep under sky at night. Because they are not registered, they cannot get food and the other refugees don't want them to take water. So I share everything I have with them, including food and water. [144]

Sanitation

Due to the lack of latrines and an inadequate refuse-collection system, the sanitation situation in the camps is of enormous concern. Two cholera outbreaks in Dadaab in 2007 were directly traced back to poor latrine cover and sanitation, [145] and the camps saw a new cholera outbreak in February 2009. [146]

Even before the 2008 influx, Dadaab's refugees faced a dire situation. According to NRC, at the end of 2007, Dadaab's then 171,870 registered refugees lacked 21,000 latrines and an additional latrine would be needed for every additional five refugees. [147] With 61,761 new arrivals in 2008 and 15,271 new arrivals registered in the first two months of 2009, the total latrine gap by the end of February 2009 stood at 36,271. [148]

Oxfam's recent assessment of the limited data available reached a number of conclusions. 6,000 refugees have no access to latrines whatsoever. At least 20 per cent of the camps' residents (50,000 refugees) have access that does not conform to international aid standards, and there is not enough data available to conclude whether or not the remaining 80 percent has adequate access or not. Women and children-half the camps' population-very rarely access latrines because they are not segregated, which is unacceptable to Somali women, and because the overcrowding means children cannot compete with men. Generally, latrines are poorly maintained and dirty and refugees cannot access soap and latrine cleaning materials. In summary, the assessment concluded "minimum standards of access, design and use of toilets for excreta disposal are not being met," and that the situation in the camps was "conducive to a public health emergency." [149] Similarly, in March 2009 the United Nations Country team concluded that "the potential health risks posed by overcrowding and insufficient water and sanitation are dire." [150]

Dadaab's refuse collection system dates from the early 1990s. Instead of clearing an estimated 150 tons of garbage into landfills outside the camps using skips, new tractors (or donkey carts) with winches and pulleys and central collection points, the system still relies on wheelbarrows, shovels, and rakes to collect the garbage locally, which is then piled into (and burnt in) small holes throughout the camp that are then back-filled, creating small mounds of barely concealed garbage. [151] Shelters are built around these mounds, leading to fire risks and serious health risks when the rains come. [152]

Healthcare

Even before the influx, healthcare teams working for GTZ-the only healthcare NGO in Dadaab's camps-were unable to address many of the refugees' chronic health needs and there is a shortage of medication and qualified medical staff in the camps' clinics. According to UNHCR, by mid-2008 "the health situation among the refugees [was] still far below the minimum standards," that on average there was one health facility for every 17,000 refugees, and that "crude mortality, maternal mortality, infant mortality and under-five mortality rates are currently far below WHO standards." [153]

With the new influx, the pressure on the healthcare system is enormous. GTZ say that to work to required standards, they need a significant increase in qualified nurses, midwives, clinical officers and doctors, and that in particular Dagahaley camp's hospital needs to be significantly improved.[154]UNHCR confirmed that funding shortages mean all of Dadaab's health posts and hospitals face drug (including vaccine) and skilled-staff shortages, leading to a lack of adequate treatment and an over-reliance on incentive workers.[155]

Human Rights Watch spoke with many sick refugees recently arrived in the camps who said they had either been unable to access clinics because staff had required them to show a food ration card [156] , or-if they had gained access-said they had not been given adequate treatment. As an example, an emaciated clearly severely sick man who had been living under a tree behind UNHCR's compound in Dagahaley for six weeks, said he was constantly vomiting, but that when he finally managed to pay his way into a clinic in Dagahaley, he was not seen by a doctor and was given paracetamol and multi-vitamin tablets. [157]

In 2006 and 2007, Dadaab's camps saw a number of epidemics (cholera, measles, and Rift Valley Fever). [158] With the increased numbers and concentration of refugees, lack of land, lack of water, and the appalling sanitation conditions, the risk of a renewed cholera outbreak is a constant possibility, as shown by the cholera outbreak in February 2009 that was fortunately swiftly contained by emergency health teams. [159]

Funding for Dadaab's Camps

Three UN agencies (UNHCR, UNICEF, WFP), the International Organization for Migration (IOM), the Kenyan Red Cross, and numerous international NGOs assist Dadaab's refugees. To date, UNHCR has not comprehensively set out the budget (and budgetary sources) of Dadaab's aid agencies, which makes it hard to determine the extent to which the Dadaab operation is under-funded. However, all agencies interviewed for this report agreed that Dadaab was clearly massively under-funded, leaving them in no doubt that a significant increase in funding was needed to ensure that the appalling state of Dadaab's camps is improved and that new camps are built to help decongest them and receive new arrivals. [160]

Even before the 36 percent increase in the camps' population in 2008, UNHCR's $15 million annual budget for 2007 and 2008 was far below the estimated $50 million needed to cope with the long-term needs of the camps' 2007 population of 152,000 refugees. [161] UNHCR says that its budget for the past two years has been totally inadequate to deal with refugees' needs, that the new arrivals rate in 2007 and 2008 has put UNHCR and NGOs in Daddab in a "constant emergency mode," and that most of the available funds have been targeted at new arrivals, leaving very few funds to address the needs of refugees arriving before 2007. [162]

By October 2008, UNHCR had drawn up a 2009 budget of $17 million, a 13 percent increase on an already inadequate budget that was supposed to cope with the need for at least one new camp ($20 million), with a 64 percent increase in the camp's population in 2007 and 2008 [163] (total cost unknown), and with Dadaab's pre-2007 long-term needs ($50 million). [164]

After Human Rights Watch encouraged UNHCR to present donors with a full breakdown of its financial needs for Dadaab, UNHCR issued a Supplementary Appeal on December 19, 2008, for a little over $70 million, in addition to the $21.4 million it had already asked for under its Global Appeal for 2009. [165] This money is intended to cover the cost of "identified operational gaps and unmet needs" of the 235,000 refugees registered in Dadaab by the end of 2008, the cost of providing for up to 120,000 new refugees in 2009, and the cost of constructing new camps capable of sheltering approximately 100,000 refugees. [166]

Refugees' food needs in Dadaab are covered separately by the World Food Program (WFP). Between October 1, 2007, and September 30, 2009, WFP's Dadaab budget is $92,001,788 (an average of $3,883,408 per month). As of mid February 2009, WFP said that this budget was fully funded until June 30, 2009, and that it would be issuing a further appeal to cover refugees' needs after that time.[167]