CEO Corner: World Refugee Day

June 20, 2021 was World Refugee Day, dedicated to raising awareness of the situation of refugees, globally. As Refugee serving organization, it saddens us at Skills for Change that since the global focus on the 2015-2016 “refugee crisis”, Refugees have largely dropped from the political, media and social agenda, especially as the COVID-19 pandemic has momentarily suppressed refugee movements. COVID-19 has dramatically impaired countries’, mainly in the global south, capability to support an influx of refugees.

For the past year, countries in the globally north have concentrated primarily on the health concerns of the pandemic; slowly, the focus is changing towards the economic impact on the global south that could increase the number of refugees. The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals emphasizes focus on the links between development policy sectors. We see that the pandemic has revealed the complicated global interdependencies that underlie economies and underscored fault lines in societal constructs that propagate racial, monetary, societal, and gender disparities.

Urgent focus is needed on the current and future needs of Refugees. We cannot lose focus.

Skills for Change’s CEO Corner is a series of articles and commentary from our CEO, Surranna Sandy.