The city of Mogadishu now hosts more than 600,000 Internally Displaced People (IDP)—one-third of the total figure in the East African nation.

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In a new report, the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC) examines the financial costs of internal displacement across major crises around the world, raising awareness of the importance of preventing future displacement as well as responding to such situations efficiently.

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“We have long understood the devastating impact internal displacement can have on the safety and wellbeing of people affected by conflict, violence, disasters, and development projects.

But internal displacement also places a heavy burden on the economy, by limiting people’s ability to work and generating specific needs that must be paid for by those affected, their hosts, governments or aid providers” 

~IDMC’s Director, Alexandra Bilak.

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The report also notes that the impacts of internal displacement are far higher in low-income countries, partially due to the lack of capacity to minimize the impacts of crises.

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The Central African Republic (CAR) is one such low-income country, with over 70 percent of the country estimated to be living in poverty.

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CAR has seen decades of instability and violence, and its most recent conflict has resulted in an ongoing, dire humanitarian crisis and the displacement of over 1 million people, more than half of whom have stayed within the country’s borders.

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Approximately two million people are severely food insecure in the country, while UNICEF projects that over 43,000 children under the age of five will face severe acute malnutrition which, if left untreated, is fatal.

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Combined with the additional costs associated with providing healthcare to IDPs in emergency settings, health accounts for half of the economic impact of the Central African Republic displacement crisis.

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“This new research clearly shows the risk internal displacement represents, not only for human rights and security but also for national development,” said Bilak.

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