American Refugee Committee
International
2009
Student Name
Technical Writing 2311
11/18/2009

Table of Contents

Problems ARC Confront 3 Healthcare and HIV/AIDS Gender Based Violence

Continued 4 Warfare Economy Water

Solutions ARC Offer 4 Countries Principles

Benefits ARC Give 6

Success Stories 6 Maybe Brown Alice Kollie Murekezi Simeon

Works Cited 8

“The American Refugee Committee International (ARC) is a major international non-profit, non-sectarian organization focused on helping refugees and displaced people regain control of their lives.”

Problems ARC Confronts

The American Refugee Committee currently serves seven countries and focus on several main concerns: warfare, civil violence, economic crisis, unsanitary water and shortage, and lack of healthcare, concerning AIDS/HIV outbreaks and other infectious diseases. Unfortunately, “today, there are roughly sixty-seven million people in need of international protection and assistance. Approximately, sixteen million are refugees and fifty-one million are internally displaced people” (American Refugee Committee np).

Healthcare and HIV/AIDS: The numbers in these statistics outlines a significant problem the ARC is taking on in some areas. Uganda is one of the countries ARC provides help in and the considerable amount of people that are being affected by HIV/AIDS is shocking: “There are currently an estimated 940,000 people living with HIV in Uganda, and a further 1.2 million children who have been orphaned by AIDS.” There have been approximately one million people that have died with AIDS in Uganda (American Refugee Committee np).

Research suggests that there is also a “low level of understanding about HIV transmission among many Sudanese people. Only 9% of women aged between 15 and 49 years could identify the main causes of HIV transmission” and ”less than 25% of Sudanese people aged 12 to 25 years knew that HIV could be transmitted through unprotected sex.” There is a major shortage of healthcare workers ("Sudan Launches HIV/AIDS Curriculum” np). For example, in Liberia there are only .3 nurses and midwives per the 1,000 population” (Kinfu 226).

Gender Based Violence: Women are at very high risk for HIV/AIDS due to domestic and sexual violence. For instance, ten percent of sexually experienced females between the ages of fifteen and twenty-four were sexually assaulted, and another twenty-eight percent reported that they did not want to have their first sexual encounter, indicating that they were coerced into sex. Research also suggests that these women continue to experience violence throughout their lives in marital relationships. Sadly, “women who experience domestic violence by their partners have a 50% increased risk of contracting HIV” (Peacock and Levack 180).
Warfare: Many refugees are displaced or hurt due to prolonged and escalating violence in their countries. For example, in Pakistan, another country ARC assists, “since the 1970’s, three million Afghan refugees have fled to Pakistan to escape drought, an oppressive Taliban government, and constant conflict and threat.” In Sierra Leone, a civil war that lasted for eleven years, and in neighboring country, Liberia, a civil war has been going on for fourteen years. While the conflict in Sierra Leone ended in 2000, hundreds of thousands had been forced to flee their homes (American Refugee Committee np).

Economy: Due to the fighting, the economy in many developing countries has suffered as homes, farms, wells, health clinics, schools are destroyed. Many people have no way of making a living (American Refugee Committee np).

Water: The water treatment plants aren’t producing water that is acceptable and safe to drink. Approximately, three hundred million Africans have no access to safe drinking water, and only 3.8 percent of the continent’s water resources have been developed “due to the installation of inappropriate treatment systems, a lack of knowledge of basic treatment principles by plant operators, inadequate maintenance of equipment, financial constraints and a lack of community involvement at planning stages, amongst other factors” (Momba 335).

Solutions ARC Offers

The ARC assists so many different problems by offering various Support programs and opportunities to those in need. ARC assisted 2.5 million people last year in the countries:

The table below shows the work being done by the ACR in each country served: Liberia | Giving loans, gender based violence (GBV) prevention/awareness, aid clinics and business development. | Pakistan | Educating the community, HIV/AIDS prevention/awareness, healthcare and training, GBV prevention/response, counseling and water sanitation. | Rwanda | Healthcare training, mother/child care, shelter construction, microenterprise development and water sanitation. | Sierra Leone | Giving small business loans, and training/development for small businesses. | Sudan | Healthcare, HIV/AIDS prevention/awareness, small business development, GBV prevention/response, microloans, community reintegration and water sanitation. | Sudan- Darfur | Agricultural support, mother/child care, infrastructure reconstruction and water sanitation. | Thailand | Health care training, mother/child care, GBV prevention/response, disease prevention, micro enterprise development and water sanitation. | Uganda | GBV prevention/response, conflict prevention and HIV prevention/awareness. |

Through the work that the American Refugee Committee provides they keep the following principles in mind.

*
Ethics Dignity
Optimism Service
Self Sufficiency Advocacy

The solutions being offered are going to make a huge difference for these people in need. After providing all the services refugees are being able to start over and begin new lives whether it is providing a small loan or sanitary drinking water to healthcare of all sorts (American Refugee Committee np).

“A refugee is someone who has been forced from their home country by war, civil conflict, political strife, natural disaster or gross human rights abuses. Most of the time, refugees must flee their home and villages without warning, taking with them only the clothes on their backs” (American Refugee Committee np).

Benefits of ARC

There are many benefits that this nonprofit offers to not only the people that it serves but also to the communities around them, and to the readers learning about ARC.
ARC offers programs that give small loans ($40-50) to entrepreneurs that will help reconstruct their lives and families to a more productive standard of living. These micro-enterprise development programs (MEDs) provide classes that teach the skills needed to so that individuals can develop businesses that are successful. MEDs benefit individuals and contribute to “economic growth, alleviate poverty and reduce unemployment for entire communities” (American Refugee Committee np).
Since the majority of refugees (80%) are women and children and because women in developing nations are less likely to be able to obtain loans, the MED programs help women who might otherwise have few resources.
The ARC strives to improve the lives of those in need through their health care initiatives, economic programs, and counseling efforts.

Success Stories
These are a few of millions success stories that the ARC have made come true.

Maybe Brown was a women living in a camp for displaced people in Liberia when she became an “ARC peer.” She is now one of her village’s only advocates for women like her that need help concerning health issues such as, HIV/AIDS, contraception, and domestic violence.

One of the most repeated problems that Maybe sees is wife beating. Maybe provides herself as a friend and counselor to women and even men that come to her for help. Maybe is there to educate her village with the knowledge ARC provided her on how to stop domestic violence.
“It’s a big job, but Maybe likes doing it because she sees the positive impact of her work. She passes on her knowledge to her three children, preparing them to become informed, healthy adults and community leaders” (American Refugee Committee International np).

Success Stories
Alice Kollie is 47 years old and a single mother that has just returned to home in Liberia from staying in a refugee camp in Guinea. After her husband dying in the civil war, she and her three children moved out of Liberia and then almost ten years later moved back to Liberia. Ready to start over she had trouble getting back on her feet. She attempted to farm rice, but had to quit due to a serious injury. Needing money to live, she began selling fish, just barely getting her by.
One day, while Alice was working ARC business development agents came to the market where Alice worked. After listening to her problems, they invited her to a training program where she would receive $35 of a $70 grant after completing the week of training. She used the money to increase her stock of fish and to start selling other items like, salt, maple, farina, candies, honey, peanuts, matches, and so much more.
“My business has grown, I am so thankful. Without the program I would probably be dead from worry. Now… no more worries: I can eat and feed my family. I will never forget what ARC has done for me. They have taught me how to manage and plan my business and gave me hope” (American Refugee Committee International np).

Murekezi Simeon is an 82 year-old man. Murekezi and his wife had to flee their village in the Democratic Republic of the Congo after war broke out. Murekezi was able to make it to safety at the ARC camps in Gihembe but his wife died along the journey. He had lost almost everything on his to Gihembe and had no way of supporting himself there.
As Simeon describes, “I became sickly, because I was inactive. I had no way of buying myself clothing or covering my needs each day.” He had been a farmer is whole life, but after losing everything there was no way to buy the seeds or tools needed to start over. At the remarkable age of 82, this had been the first time in his grown up life that he had no job, until he too like Alice joined a skill building class on how to manage money and get back on your feet. Receiving $50 for seeds, he began farming again.”
“Murekezi’s tree seedlings are making a small difference to combat dangerous deforestation throughout Rwanda, and Murekezi is able to support himself again” (American Refugee Committee np).
Works Cited

American Refugee Committee. 17 Nov 2009. <http://www.answers.com/topic/american-refugee-committee>

American Refugee Committee International. 17 Nov 2009. <http://www.arcrelief.org/site>

HIV & AIDS in Uganda. 17 Nov 2009. <http://www.avert.org/aids-uganda.htm>

Kinfu, Yohannes, et al. "The Health Worker Shortage in Africa: Are Enough Physicians and Nurses Being Trained?" Bulletin of the World Health Organization 87.3 (2009): 225-230. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 9 Nov. 2009.

Momba, M. N. B., et al. "A Model Partnership for Sustainable Production of Safe Drinking Water for Rural Communities in South Africa." South African Journal of Science 101.7/8 (2005): 335-336. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 11 Nov. 2009.

Peacock, Dean, and Andrew Levack. "The Men as Partners Program in South Africa: Reaching Men to End Gender-Based Violence and Promote Sexual and Reproductive Health." International Journal of Men's Health 3.3 (2004): 173-188. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 9 Nov. 2009.

"Sudan Launches HIV/AIDS Curriculum." Infectious Disease News Feb. 2009: 23. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 9 Nov. 2009.