Background and objectives:

SOLSES, a rehabilitation programme for refugee-impacted areas and communities, is an inter-agency partnership created to enhance livelihood security and wellbeing for people living in or adjacent to refugee camps in eastern Sudan. This is done through the environmental restoration of refugee-impacted areas and the rehabilitation of social and physical infrastructure. The programme was successfully launched among the partners, donors and government representatives in September 2004 and UN-HABITAT and IUCN created a programme management unit for the management of SOLSES under a separate joint programme document.

The long-term goals are the closure of a number of refugee camps; the environmental restoration and rehabilitation of the camps’ social and physical infrastructure and subsequent handing over to the host municipality; and the establishment of greater economic self-reliance among refugees and their descendants.

Activities:
The main activities included:

• Training local authorities in various aspects of urban governance.
• Institutional capacity building.
• Promoting local economic development, infrastructure maintenance and environmental management.
• Supporting the implementation of critical services and infrastructure demonstration projects.
• Promoting environmental protection and management through hands-on training of local communities and other local stakeholders.

Results:
The achievements in 2008 included:

• Implementation of capacity-building and infrastructure upgrading projects in two areas of refugee hosting areas - Suki and Girba camps - in eastern and central Sudan.
• Demonstration activities include rehabilitation of schools, water station, children’s ward and teacher’s housing.