Middle East, North Africa and Europe
Syria ranks 151 out of 189 on the Human Development Index (HDI). CARE International responds to the Syrian crisis in partnership with national organizations, supporting food security and helping to develop resilience programs.
CARE International began working in Syria in 2013 to provide life-saving emergency assistance to people affected by conflict.
The Syrian crisis has been ongoing since 2011, and CARE International remains gravely concerned about the impact of the conflict on civilians, who continue to pay a heavy price. Civilians are targeted and are living in dire conditions in besieged areas with grave humanitarian needs. The conflict has caused the largest displacement crisis in the world, with more than half of the country’s population displaced.
CARE International responds to the crisis inside Syria through a network of partners. Our response in Syria includes support for food security and re-establishing livelihoods. With partners, we provide reproductive, primary care, and maternal health, as well as shelter, clean water, and proper sanitation. We also distribute relief supplies and multi-purpose cash vouchers for food as well as hygiene and baby kits, dignity kits for the elderly and sanitary products.
Where possible, CARE International helps rebuild livelihoods by developing resilience programs and providing families with early recovery support. This includes agricultural production, livestock programs, cash for work, microfinance, and concerted protection programming; including for gender-based violence, case management, and psychosocial programming.
The protracted 13-year conflict and the attendant economic crisis and loss of livelihoods for millions of Syrians, coupled with a three-year long drought impacting agricultural production, has left an unprecedented number of Syrians in need of aid.
As the Syria conflict enters its 13th year, the humanitarian situation across the country continues to worsen, with more than 70 percent of the population in need of assistance.
With a severely underfunded humanitarian response, thousands of families continue to endure precarious living conditions worsened by freezing temperatures.
Northwest Syria faces a deepening crisis as extreme heat, water scarcity, and food insecurity intensify, compounded by dwindling aid. Amira*, a mother of six provides a stark illustration of the daily struggles faced by millions in the region.
Fleeing their village due to repeated shelling, Samira* and her family of 13 people have been living in a refugee camp in Northwest Syria for five years now. In this account, she shares the difficulties faced due to displacement, with scarcity of water, poor sanitation, and living in tents with no protection from the cold.
Earthquakes are gender neutral but their impacts are not. CARE's Rapid Gender Analysis (RGA) Brief explores existing gender, age and disability data and information to understand pre-existing vulnerabilities and capacities and how best humanitarians can respond to meet people’s different needs.
CARE has conducted regional and whole country Rapid Gender Analyses to better assess the needs amid the critical humanitarian emergency in Syria.
Together with other 30 NGOs, CARE calls on the United Nations Security Council to renew the Syria cross-border resolution, which authorizes the UN to deliver life-saving aid to millions of Syrians in need
In FY2023, CARE worked around the world, contributing to saving lives, fighting poverty, and increasing social justice.
