Responsive and Integrated Education, Shelter, and Legal Protection Solutions for Returnees and Prolonged IDPs in Eastern, Central, and Southern Afghanistan The proposed project will primarily target undocumented Afghan returnees in Eastern (Nangarhar, Kunar, Laghman), Southern (Kandahar), and Central (Kabul) Afghanistan for an integrated shelter, education, and legal protection support. Secondarily prolonged IDPs and vulnerable host community members found in the vicinity, and who meet the set vulnerability criteria, will also be targeted for support. The project, implemented directly by the Norwegian Refugee Council, continuing recent and long-standing interventions in these areas, is aligned with the CHF Allocation Strategy Envelopes 2, 3, and 4, and has been coordinated through relevant fora, notably the Emergency Shelter/NFI Cluster, Education in Emergency (EiE) Working Group, and the Afghanistan Protection Cluster. The multi-sectoral approach is intended to be more effective and cost-efficient, allowing a more comprehensive solution for the most vulnerable displacement-affected communities.

Shelter: Both transitional and emergency shelter solutions will be delivered in eastern Afghanistan. Since the sudden onset of refugee returns, NRC (with CHF and SIDA funding) erected over 2,000 emergency and transitional shelters. Resources are now fully exhausted, and yet needs are extant and emerging. NRC will provide a further 500 transitional shelters with household (HH) latrines (reducing protection risks of women and girls). These interventions will protect from the physical elements approximately 3,820 men (16%), women (17%), boys (35%), and girls (32%), safeguard their dignity, reduce illness and emergency-related death in Nangarhar (60%), Laghman (30%), and Kunar (10%). Given the complexity of secure tenure in shelter programming, the Protection component outlined below is necessary as a complementary intervention for Extremely Vulnerable Households (EVHH). 

EiE:  NRC will scale up its current service provision of 120 Temporary Learning Spaces (TLS) (primarily funded through Norwegian MFA and SIDA), by a further 160 TLS, particularly in communities substantially supported with shelter interventions in eastern Afghanistan, but also in southern Afghanistan. This increases the absorptive capacity of approximately 45 formal host community schools, providing EiE for a further 7,200 returnee boys (50%) and girls (50%) in Nangarhar (40%), Laghman (10%), Kunar (15%), and Kandahar (35%). In schools with inadequate WASH facilities, gender-segregated school latrine blocks will also be provided. The project will recruit 160 teachers (50% female) amongst the undocumented returnee communities, and conduct community sensitisation (in line with the EiE WG ‘Back to Learning’ campaign), which may be combined with hygiene promotion sessions reducing open defecation and improving hygiene practices (a further 12,000 boys and girls in the catchment area will benefit from these ‘WASH-for-EiE’ interventions).

Protection: NRC will direct its longstanding Information, Counselling, and Legal Assistance (ICLA) programme to provide legal services for protection cases and principled referrals, primarily targeting returnees in eastern Afghanistan, but also those found in southern and central parts. The project also targets prolonged IDPs and vulnerable host community members in the vicinity, with counselling and legal assistance pertaining to civil documentation and Housing, Land and Property (HLP) rights, referring displaced individuals to other protection service providers and to assist them access other essential services, promoting their protection and an early recovery for their households and communities. NRC will provide dedicated legal counselling and assistance to approximately 2,538 returnee and prolonged IDP EVI in the provinces of Nangarhar (50%), Kunar (15%), Laghman (15%) and Kabul (20%).  It will also provide capacity-building and legal awareness to a further 600 beneficiaries.  Accordingly, the total number of direct beneficiaries reached through ICLA programming is 3,138.