Rapid Community-Based Shelter Needs Assessment - Baiji

Baiji Community-Based Shelter Need Assessment

GENARAL INFORMATION:

Baiji is a city which is located in the northern part of and related to Salah Aldin governorate, it’s a big city and it was containing more than 200,000 inhabitants before 2014. During the crises and battles in 2014 and 2015, most of the people have been displaced from baiji to surrounding cities such as (, , AlAlam, , …etc.). After Baiji’s liberation, only small numbers of people have started to return back to their houses because the bigger part of Baiji city have been destroyed or burned due to the consecutive battles, in addition, there is still some areas and sub-districts are inaccessible until the moment for different reasons.

ASSESSMENT & CONCLUSION

On 16th,17th of April 2018, We went to Baiji (Salah Aldin Shelter team), with mentioning that only 2 sub-districts were accessible which are (Hay Alasri and Aljadida) “Adjacent neighbors”. We met the local council and the Mukhtar for those 2 neighbors, we got some general information in regard to the number of families who have returned and the number of houses that affected during the last period, see the below table

The below numbers are approximate

Total number of families returned More than 3000 families Total number of houses More than 7000 Total number of totally burned houses More than 600 Total number of totally destroyed houses More than 500 Total number of damaged or semi “minor” The rest of the houses damaged houses

Rapid Community-Based Shelter Needs Assessment - Baiji

Here is the map that shows these 2 neighbors in Baiji (Highlighted) Coordinates (34.929231 Long., 43.493046 Lat.)

The highlighted zone in the map is referred to the 2 sub-districts that we visited, the Green border is referred to the whole Baiji. 1- Hay Al-Asry 2- Jadida Rapid Community-Based Shelter Needs Assessment - Baiji

In addition to the meetings with Mukhtar and local council, we made so many interviews with many people that are living in Baiji at the moment, we met people from different ages, gender, backgrounds and professions. Some interviews were door-to-door and the others were in the street and the number of total interviews is as below:

Males Females

Age Profession Background Age Profession Background

45 B.C.s math. Teacher 37 Housewife Secondary education

22 Primary education Unskilled construction worker 32 Housewife Primary education

38 Secondary education Plaster 37 Housewife Primary education

Bachelor degree in 41 agriculture. Shopkeeper 45 Teacher Secondary (diploma)

45 Secondary education Shopkeeper 52 Housewife Secondary education

30 Bachelor degree Technician 35 Housewife Primary education

39 Primary education Construction skilled worker 42 Teacher Secondary (diploma)

52 Secondary education Mukhtar 40 Housewife Secondary education

Has no profession, sometimes as an 18 Primary education unskilled worker

35 Not educated Unskilled worker

48 Secondary education Mukhtar

43 Secondary education Local council representative

41 Secondary education IDPs representative

In total, the total number of males 13, females 8 as explained above. The people interviewed were having almost the same concerns. For the shelter needs, most of the people were requesting to repair and fix their houses especially the infrastructure elements, most of them said they need construction main works like doors, windows, electricity works, handrails, brick & block works, water network works, sanitation works, openings closure, concreting works, plastering works … etc. Rapid Community-Based Shelter Needs Assessment - Baiji

In addition, some of the people stated that they need something like EKs in order to start rehabilitating their houses and doing the works themselves, they told us that if they have money they would buy the materials and start working on their houses rehabilitation. From the above and as we saw during our visit we can conclude that most of the returnees do not have the enough money or materials to repair or rehabilitate their houses so they need anything could help them in this, so the rehabilitation works and even the EKs will be very much useful to them. Here are some photos for some burned, damaged or semi-damaged houses

Rapid Community-Based Shelter Needs Assessment - Baiji

Regarding the response mechanism in Baiji since the returnees started to return, only one organization did some rehabilitation works for 101 houses (2 rooms per each house), the works contained (plastering, electrical works, windows, doors, fans, glass works … etc.) Rapid Community-Based Shelter Needs Assessment - Baiji

The other responses were only assessments from different NGOs and they were not effective at all. Hence we can say that only small rehabilitation works have been done during the last year in Baiji and now there are so many people who need such kind of works in order to improve their living conditions or even to return to their original houses, as some of them are not living in their original houses because they are damaged or burned or even destroyed and they don’t have money to fix, repair or re-build them, so they are living in their friends’ or relatives’ houses and the most of them are not paying rent. With mentioning that the number of returned families will be increased after May or June this year as the school “study” year will be finished at that time. The people’s living conditions were very miserable and poor and what we saw is really bad, more than 95% of the people are in-need especially for rehabilitation works, most of the houses need rehabilitation works as soon as possible in addition to infrastructure projects. From the above photos, conclusion and interview we can notice that any shelter program whether it’s a rehabilitation or EKs will be much great for such areas. Referring to work opportunities in Baiji nowadays, we’ve asked so many people about whether there is an enough work or not, about the daily rates for skilled and unskilled labors, professions and types of skills that are available and about their opinions in how to provide opportunities.

Daily rate Labor Notes IQD

According to the profession (The high cost 30,000 - for the carpenters and steel bars workers Skilled 45,000 and the low costs are for the ordinary construction workers or masons)

20,000 - Unskilled According to the work type 25,000

Carpenters "formworks and doors" Smithers "steel bars works, windows and doors" Plasters Water and sewage piping workers Types of professions available Masons Concrete workers Painters Cleaners

Rapid Community-Based Shelter Needs Assessment - Baiji

In regard to the job opportunities, most of the people stated that there is no enough work neither for the skilled or unskilled workers in construction field, and that’s due to lack of construction and rehabilitation activities in the area for different reasons and of course the effective reason is that the people do not have the enough resources to start doing such works. Constructions shops are available in the both of areas (Hey Al-Asri and Jadida), 6 or 7 shops per each area. The shops containing the fundamental materials for rehabilitation such as (Doors, windows, paints, concrete, pipes, taps, gypsum … etc.) It’s important to mention that all of the people that are living in Baiji now are returnees. Some of them are living in their original houses and the others are living in their relatives of friends’ houses and the most of them are not paying rent, referring to the assessment that we did we found that 90% who are not living in their original houses are not paying rents, and the other 10% are paying rents. During the assessment we’ve asked the people who are paying rent about the average of their monthly income, the number was varying between the families but as a general range it was from 250,000 – 300,000 IQD In addition, we’ve asked for the monthly rents per house and are the conditions adequate or not? Most of the people said that the rent monthly average is from 150,000 – 250,000 IQD according to the house conditions, they said the prices are good and not very high because the rents were between 350,000 and 450,000 before 2014. Regarding the houses conditions in Baiji, we can say that they are semi-adequate or poor as 50% percent of the rented houses contain the essentials living conditions such as doors and windows but they are in a very bad conditions, the people cannot do anything even the owners as most of the owners are not taking rent or they don’t have money to repair their houses. And the other 50% of houses are not good at all, they are even without windows or doors or so many openings in the roof … etc. Finally, and for the people who are living in their original houses, all of them have the ownership documents. For the people who do not have their original documents for their houses, the Mukhtar said we need assistance to re-open the real estate registration department in Baiji, because the old one is destroyed and burned.