Working Group Description

The shelter sector aims to provide Syrian refugee women, girls, boys, and men, with an increase focus on persons with disabilities and elderly settled in host communities and in planned and developed camps with adequate shelter and access to basic facilities and services. In camp settings the shelter sector ensures the provision of adequate shelter through the distribution of prefabricated shelter units, providing shelter maintenance to vulnerable families, self-repair scheme which aims to enhance skills and support refugees in achieving greater self-sufficiency and prepare for dignified voluntary return to Syria, as well as infrastructure maintenance and winter response plan to ensure adequate access to households and the different services and facilities. In non-camp settings the shelter sector adopts five key response strategies to ensure the provision of adequate shelter support to refugees: 1) upgrading sub-standard housing units, in which refugees and vulnerable Jordanians live, to meet adequate living standards; 2) enhancing the capacity of refugees to adapt to and withstand extreme weather events without sharp increase of utility bills through providing solar heating and water heating systems; 3) providing conditional financial assistance to meet rental and utility costs, and for ensuring security of tenure; 4) adapting sub-standard dwelling units to overcome harsh weather conditions with “house adaptation kits” provided either in the form of NFI packages or a cash equivalent through conditional cash grants; and 5) enhancing awareness on tenure rights and obligations amongst women, girls, boys and men refugee tenants and target all refugees who reside in non-camp settings. The shelter working group is co-chaired by UNHCR and Habitat for Humanity.