History
Catholic Relief Services started working in Burundi in 1963, focusing on maternal and child health, and social welfare. In 1986, CRS shifted its activities toward longer-term sustainable development in the areas of agriculture, health, HIV and AIDS, microfinance, and peace and justice.
When war broke out in 1993, CRS addressed emergency needs while continuing ongoing development projects. The situation improved in 2003, and democratic elections followed in 2005. The last remaining rebel group laid down its weapons in 2009. With peace prevailing in the country, CRS and our partners are transitioning from emergency response programs to more development efforts.
Partners
Working with CRS since 2006, Maison Shalom a nondenominational and politically neutral agency, was founded to offer children a better future. Based in Ruyigi, Burundi, Maison Shalom protects children from the devastating effects of civil war and HIV, and provided social and psychological help during interethnic massacres and civil war. They advocate for children's education and recently expanded to include a daycare center, school and professional training facilities, and a hospital offering a maternity ward, emergency services and a laboratory.
Programs
Agriculture
CRS is implementing a 4-year project in six countries in Africa's Great Lakes region. In Burundi, the project is strengthening the skills of nine partners to respond to cassava mosaic disease and emerging cassava brown streak disease pandemics that threaten the adequacy of the food supply and the incomes of cassava farmers. The project is improving knowledge and disease diagnostics for the management of cassava viruses and virus vectors and is allowing farmers to access improved cassava varieties for production.
CRS has also introduced Savings and Internal Lending Communities among Great Lakes Cassava Initiative partner and farmer groups, ensuring opportunities for women to participate.
Since 2001, CRS Burundi has implemented an emergency project to enable 863,000 subsistence farmers to access a variety of quality agricultural seeds, while also enhancing local seed production. CRS seed fairs provide farmers with vouchers worth a specific cash value. Farmers with vouchers are able to choose seeds and negotiate prices with seed vendors who then redeem the vouchers for cash from CRS.
Seed fairs are held in Burundi in February, March, September and October—prior to the two growing seasons.
CRS Burundi is implementing a 5-year program in consortium with Food for the Hungry, International Medical Corps and Caritas Burundi to contribute to the stability of the food supplies in Cankuzo and Ruyigi provinces in northern and eastern Burundi. Women and children under the age of 5 can now access quality nutrition and health services, households can practice appropriate health and nutrition behaviors, and eligible women and children can increase their intake of a variety of foods.
Important operational research, led by the Food and Nutrition Technical Assistance and the International Food Policy Research Institute, will accompany this project.
CRS is implementing a 3-year project to reduce the impact of HIV, violence, and poverty on 34,000 orphans and vulnerable children in Burundi. The project is improving access to education and social support services as well as medical and HIV services across a continuum of care. Approximately 20,000 orphans and vulnerable children, their families, caretakers and community members will increase their economic situations, with an emphasis on self-sufficiency.
The projects aims to strengthen the community's ability to protect the rights of orphans and vulnerable children over the long term and to strengthen the skills of at least eight CRS partners to provide quality support for these children affected by HIV.
CRS Burundi improves livelihoods by expanding and consolidating Savings and Internal Lending Communities (SILC). SILC increases the financial means of poor families in rural areas through a village savings system. The savings program provides positive returns, an internal loan fund, and a community insurance fund for emergency situations affecting SILC group members.
CRS Burundi is integrating the SILC methodology into its programming for HIV, agriculture, and justice and peace. Our current SILC program has approximately 4,200 participants. To ensure the sustainability of SILC, CRS Burundi and our local partners are training and establishing networks of SILC specialists who work with saving groups to ensure quality.
CRS, in partnership with International Medical Corps (IMC), is implementing a 3-year project to improve the stability of the food supply in villages in northeast Burundi. The project gives Burundians the tools and know-how to achieve better health, nutrition, and clean drinking water; improve livelihoods through environmentally sustainable agricultural production, agro-enterprise activities, and microfinance; and improve community resilience and capacity to respond to shocks through early warning systems and programs designed to empower both men and women. This program is using both cash and food aid resources from the United States Agency for International Development's Office of Food for Peace to improve access to food.
In addition, CRS is implementing a 3-year project to increase the food supply of 6,000 vulnerable households in Kayanza province and to decrease poverty and hunger. Specifically, CRS is working to improve livelihoods and income revenues through environmentally sustainable agricultural production.
