The Central Sahel: A children’s crisis

The Sahel Region currently faces an unprecedented crisis as escalating violence, rising levels of food insecurity, continued displacement, and the impacts of the COVID19 pandemic, all converge to create one of the worst humanitarian emergencies in the world right now. Already, the region was one of the poorest and most challenging areas to grow up, with Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger all ranking in the bottom 10 worst places in the world to be a child.

Despite national, regional and international efforts to tackle the complex range of inter-connected challenges facing the Sahel, the region continues to be threatened by cyclical instability, state fragility, changing climate, and recurring humanitarian crises. Without addressing the root causes of insecurity and providing further investment in multidimensional solutions to the crisis, an entire generation of children risk having their survival, education and protection destroyed.