Chad is a low-income, food-deficit country, ranked163th out of 169 countries in the 2010 UNDP Human Development Index. In the past six years, Chad has hosted 255,000 refugees from Sudan’s Darfur region and 77,000 refugees from the Central African Republic; in addition, 188,000 Chadians have been displaced by fighting in the east of the country.
Poverty in Chad has been aggravated by various conflicts during 50 years of independence. Tensions between ethnic groups in the north and in the south of the country have further contributed to political and economic instability. Moreover, Chad is subject to spill-over effects from crises in neighbouring Sudan and the Central African Republic.
Economic development in Chad is inhibited by its landlocked location and the desert climate in the north. The Sahelian zone (central and eastern Chad) is particularly affected by chronic food deficits. The arrival of thousands of Sudanese refugees in the area since late 2003 has put additional pressure on limited resources, placing further stress on the already highly vulnerable local population.
Around eighty percent of the population depends on subsistence farming and herding for their livelihoods. Cereal production is heavily affected by erratic rains, cyclical droughts and locust infestations. Poor farming practices and limited access to food make the population vulnerable to food insecurity. Malnutrition is one of the main problems faced by the local population with an alarming prevalence, especially in the Sahelian zone, which faced a 20 percent global acute malnutrition rate in 2008. More than 8 percent of infants do not survive their first year, while 20 percent of children die before reaching the age of five.
Poverty and food insecurity limit access to basic education, leading to a net enrolment rate of 36.5 percent in 2010 and adult literacy rates as low as 31.8 percent.
Chad has very limited capacity to cope with the presence of refugees and relies heavily on external assistance to be able to improve its own food security, particularly in the Sahelian zone.
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