by Scott McQuade

14 February 2008

The seemingly endless view of desert scrub, termite mounds and the occasional camel are a constant reminder for Saidamon Bodamaev of Tajikistan that he is far from home.

Bodamaev is a UNV volunteer working as a Programme Officer with the World Food Programme (WFP) in Wajid, a rural settlement in the troubled South Central region of Somalia.

This barren, dusty landscape normally supports only a minimal population, yet the WFP currently distributes an average of 6,500 metric tonnes of food every month, mostly a mixture of vegetable oil and cereals including rice, maize, sorghum and beans/pulses. Wajid is a harsh, arid environment, yet is a major base for UN operations in Somalia. It is the centre of one of four operational regions for the WFP, which provides emergency food relief for upwards of 1 million people, residing in south central part of the country every year. Recent droughts and floods have compounded the disruptions to food supplies as a result of internal violence.

Bodamaev’s assignment involves distributing food to heavily pregnant and lactating women and to malnourished children under age 5 and, in times of need, to some 200,000 Internally Displaced People (IDPs). His work supports Food for Work activities that mobilize communities with different backgrounds and clans to participate in the rehabilitation and construction of new infrastructure and those ruined during the extended civil conflict. These include health clinics, schools and water drinking points.

Since arriving in April 2007 he has also been helping to run a school feeding programme, wherein the WFP encourages school attendance in return for food, in order to increase enrollments and abolish gender disparity.

The WFP has more than 200 people working in Somalia of which around 70% are local and 30% international. It has engaged six international UNV volunteers and is in the process of recruiting a further four, making UNV volunteers more than 10% of its international workforce.

“International staff are important due to the complex domestic situation,” said Tahir Nour, acting Country Director of the WFP in Somalia. The perceived impartiality of international staff is useful in the face of sensitivities among local clans, he said.

Recruiting suitable UNV volunteers is not always easy, however, as the reputation of Somalia abroad has dissuaded some potential volunteers from working here.

Bodamaev’s assignment keeps him busy and involved with colleagues from across the UN system and with the local Somali population, including displaced people. He says the work is rewarding, but the lifestyle is challenging. Aside from the constant security risk, he must guard against malaria and a range of other local ailments. Air ambulances provide emergency services and there is a doctor in the camp, but UN personnel warn that the best and safest precaution is to avoid getting sick in the first place. Bodamaev gets a break every six weeks when he can leave the region for a short time, usually by air to Nairobi, Kenya on UN-organised flights. Initially his family was concerned for his safety, he says, amid news reports of conflict between rival clans, attacks by roving bands of gunmen, and an ongoing battle between the Transitional Federal Government and the Islamic Council Union. “Now they understand that I am not in Mogadishu (the capital city), I am in a different part of Somalia, so they feel better,” he says.