Brussels – 25 April 2018. As the ‘Supporting the future of Syria and the region’ conference concludes in Brussels, the Jordan INGO Forum (JIF) welcomes the renewed partnership between Jordan and the international community to ensure that thousands of Syrian refugees and vulnerable Jordanians do not fall further into poverty.
“Despite its own economic crisis, Jordan has made great strides to welcome Syrian refugees and has been commended for doing so” explains Hanalia Ferhan, JIF representative. “At the conference, the response in Jordan was referred to as a model of global best practice, yet too many refugees remain excluded from this long-hoped for development” Ferhan warns.
Forty per cent of Syrian school-aged children remain out of school in Jordan despite the Government of Jordan’s efforts to facilitate the registration of all children living in Jordan. Both the international community and the government have yet to tackle the underlying barriers to school enrollment and retention: the poor quality of education and the increasing poverty of Syrian families which pushes children away from school.
“Groundbreaking reforms have been led by the Government of Jordan to open and ease access to work permits for Syrian refugees” continues Ferhan. “But work permits on their own do not mean new jobs”. Restrictions still exclude refugees from high-skilled employment and semi-skilled labor, hamper the registration of Syrian owned business which has left Syrian women further behind.
“We welcome the intention in the final document of the conference to open more sectors to Syrian refugees and increase women’s participation. Further flexibility, including entrepreneurship opportunities for Syrians is neither a burden nor a competition for Jordanians, but an opportunity to boost the economy, capitalise on generated revenues and further formalise the job market” continues Ferhan.
Essential to fulfilling the commitments of the Jordan Compact is the need to ensure legal and civil registration for all Syrian refugees in Jordan. The recent campaign to regularise the status of informal and unregistered Syrians in Jordan has been a very positive step and will grant essential legal protection to those who were lacking it until now. “However, the unresolved situation of tens of thousands of Syrians stranded at the northeastern border with Syria, and the thousands of refugees held in village 5 of Azraq refugee camp casts a shadow on Jordan’s efforts” comments Ferhan “At a time when the situation in Syria is not conducive to the safe and voluntary return of refugees, solutions respecting freedom of movement, due process and the principle of nonrefoulement should be found for Jordan to continue to be a model response”.
Now more than ever, it is important for the partnership between Jordan and the international community to combine sustained funding in support of Jordan’s leadership and economic needs, with a response that is needs and rights-based, as committed to in the final Brussels document.
The Jordan INGO Forum (JIF) is an independent network of 61 international non-governmental organizations (INGOs) implementing development and humanitarian programs to respond to the needs of vulnerable Jordanians, Syrian, Palestine and Iraqi refugees living in Jordan.