In South Sudan, devastating rains force thousands to leave their homes, leaving communities to deal with lack of food and abuse.
- In 2023, terrible storms forced over 379 thousand people to leave their homes.
- Communities need help because they’ve lost farms and houses.
Over 379 thousand people have been forced to leave their homes in South Sudan this year because of flooding. They had to go to higher places like the Jonglei Canal to find safety.
It has flooded villages, destroyed farms, and killed animals, making things even harder for a country that was already having a hard time with climate change and other problems.
In Jonglei State’s Pajiek, a makeshift community of relocated families is fighting to stay alive. They live in homes made of mud and grass.
Long-horned cattle walk through their flooded fields as people like Bichiok Hoth Chuiny, 70, talk about leaving their town when the water level rose and turned it into a swamp.
The World Bank says that South Sudan is the “most vulnerable country to climate change in the world.”
Ugandan dams upstream have been blamed for letting water out, which has made this year’s storms even worse.
Seasonal floods used to be doable for herding groups like the Dinka and Nuer, but now it happens at levels that have never been seen before, killing incomes and causing people to leave their homes.
How are families who have been moved coping?
- Dependence on help: People there depend a lot on food help from groups like the World Food Program (WFP).
- Problems with health care: clinics don’t have enough materials, and doctors haven’t been paid since June.
- Education Crisis: There are no schools in the new towns, so kids can’t learn simple things.
- Daily Struggles: Food amounts aren’t enough, so many people eat wild plants and water lilies to stay alive.
Families have to walk for hours through waist-high water to get to nearby towns, which is a very bad form of displacement.
People who live in the area, like Pajiek’s paramount chief Peter Kuach Gatchang, say it’s been ignored because there is no cell service, no schools, and no government presence.
South Sudan is having a hard time dealing with the crisis because its economy is weak, its government is unstable, and there is still fighting going on.
After Sudan’s civil war, oil exports were stopped, which used up even more resources.
The rising refugee situation shows how much help and attention the whole world needs right now. If something isn’t done, fragile areas will have even less food, more health risks, and more people having to move because of floods caused by climate change.