Provision of NFIs to the most vulnerable families in Deir-Ez-Zor City The Action aims at increasing access to core relief and Covid-19/Hygiene items for the most vulnerable families living in Deir Ez Zor (DEZ) city. The proposal is in line with the Fund’s Strategic Objective 1 (Provide lifesaving and life-sustaining humanitarian assistance to the most vulnerable people with an emphasis on those in areas with high severity of needs), Sector’s Specific Objectives and SRP Strategic Objectives responding to life-sustaining needs in high severity areas. DEZ city is ranked 3 in the NFI Sector’s severity scale. The proposal addressed critical gaps and meets the needs of vulnerable groups.
The humanitarian consequences for people suffering from the crisis in Syria are wide-ranging and profound. Recent economic shocks further set back the recovery of the Syrian people. The crisis has also impacted Syrian’s purchasing power: Syrians are buying fewer goods and selecting goods of lower quality.  At the same time, COVID-19 is having consequences on people’s livelihoods with many losing income and failing to access resources needed for basic needs.
The intervention is designed on GVC needs assessment (NA) conducted on families of out-of-school or at risk of dropping out for reasons related to poor economic condition of their families targeted by GVC Non-formal education programs. The analysis revealed that the majority of HHs do not have the ability to afford the basic non-food and hygiene items (see GVC needs assessment of NFI in Deir-Ez-Zor City).
To respond to the latter, and to integrate the action with education and protection programs delivered by GVC, the project targets the most vulnerable HHs among GVC’s beneficiaries’ database. 
Based on the NA outcomes on a sample of 1,000 HHs (7,523 individuals) the action will benefit 1,320 HHs, thus an estimated total of 9,923 individuals (estimation of 7.5 individuals/HH) , around 32% of the almost 31,000 PIN living in DEZ Sub-District. The project includes the distribution of Covid-19/hygiene items and core relief items. Distribution will take place in pre-identified schools on weekends. Schools as distribution points can be better monitored with respect to Covid-19 precautionary measures. Therefore, no more than 82 persons per distribution will be reached. During and after the distributions, GVC will conduct DDM and PDM, elaborated by MEAL Department. For the PDM, GVC will reach beneficiaries by phone, receive their feedback on the provided items in order to assess if the humanitarian assistance was delivered in a safe, accessible and participatory manner. COVID-19 precautionary measures will be adopted in line with Sectors’ standards, stated in Recommendations for adjusting NFI amp Emergency Shelter Distributions in the context of Covid-19 outbreak. 
The expected impact of the intervention is to mitigate the economic barriers of vulnerable HHs in DEZ city, and to improve their life conditions and resilience especially in the context of the financial crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic. The intervention will discourage negative coping mechanisms such as inadequate hygiene measures in relation to COVID-19, child labour and early marriage, as well as enhance children return/retention to education.
Since 2017, GVC provides humanitarian assistance to DEZ population through Education and WASH projects funded by OCHA, UNICEF, ECHO and the Italian Cooperation. The project is part of GVC holistic strategy to support people affected by the conflict. Owing to GVC’s long-lasting presence the intervention will be implemented by staff with strong relations with the local authorities and humanitarian actors, and complete accessibility.
GVC will coordinate with SARC, MoE, NFI and WASH Sectors as well as other present humanitarian actors (UNICEF and UNHCR) to ensure information sharing, and avoid duplication and overlapping. GVC considers the possibility to scale-up the present proposal and carry out distributions of winterization items based on identified needs of HHs.