Since December 2012, Acted has played a crucial role in supporting communities across all of Syria. Aligning with the Acted Global 3Zero Strategy, Acted employs an area-based and multisectoral approach, tailoring support to local needs and combining immediate emergency response with long-term resilience-building initiatives.
Key aspects of Acted’s strategy include Camp Coordination and Camp Management (CCCM), cash assistance, Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) services, shelter and infrastructure rehabilitation, and employment support. In all its operations and programs, Acted incorporates environmental sustainability efforts, including solarizing rehabilitated assets like water systems and integrating climate-smart practices into agricultural interventions.
The humanitarian situation in Syria remains critical after 13 years of protracted crisis marked by conflict, displacement, environmental challenges, and economic instability. In 2024, an unprecedented 16.7 million people urgently need lifesaving aid, with 90% of the population living below the poverty line. The country is home to 7.2 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) and approximately 6.7 million refugees abroad, with limited prospects for their return.
Years of hostilities have continued to exacerbate displacement and severely undermined people’s ability to meet essential needs, including access to water and food. Syria’s vulnerability to climate-related hazards, including recurrent droughts and the devastating earthquakes of 2023, has further intensified the crisis, affecting key sectors of the economy and weakening essential services and infrastructure. The ongoing economic crisis, characterized by inflation and currency devaluation, has drastically raised the cost of necessities like food, fuel, and water, depleting savings and hindering the recovery efforts of the Syrian population.
Acted in Syria
Since 2012, Acted has been dedicated to supporting communities across the Syria by integrating life-saving emergency responses with long-term resilience-building efforts.
Aligned with the 3Zero Strategy, Acted provides effective and sustainable support to help local communities to cope with and recover from multifaceted crises. This comprehensive approach includes delivering tailored multi-sectoral, targeted assistance both in and out of camps, covering water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH), Camp Coordination and Camp Management (CCCM), emergency non-food items, and regular food aid.
To ensure a lasting impact and foster early recovery and resilience in Syria, Acted employs an integrated approach that combines area-based, localization, and community-based strategies. By working closely with local partners, Acted empowers farmers and entrepreneurs to rebuild and grow their businesses, strengthening market and food value chains. To address critical challenges such as water scarcity, Acted undertakes an extensive rehabilitation of water assets, conducts water scarcity programming, and enhance local natural resources management through capacity building schemes. Sustainable solutions, including solar power for energy provision and climate-smart agricultural practices, are embedded throughout the programming to enhance long-term viability. Additionally, Acted mainstreams social cohesion and conflict sensitivity across all initiatives, ensuring that interventions not only restore livelihoods but also contribute to a stable and resilient population.
In carrying out its programmes, Acted works closely with the communities and diverse stakeholders to ensure that all assistance is relevant and sustainable, with a focus on strengthening local actors’ capacity to effectively deliver and maintain critical services at the community level.
3ZERO in Syria
In Syria, Acted is working towards the 3ZERO objective through an integrated resilience-based approach and flagship programmes:
- Towards Holistic Resilience in Vulnerable Environments (THRIVE) – to address both the immediate and structural issues of climate change, water scarcity, and land degradation in a holistic manner in rural settings.
- AGORA – to provide area-based support that is tailored to local needs and supported and guided by local knowledge, structures and capacities.
- Grassroots Organization Capacity Assessment (GOCA), Acted’ signature civil society organizational capacity assessment and development toolkit, to analyze the organisational and institutional capacity of local and national civil society organisations (CSOs)
- Camp Coordination and Camp Management (CCCM), with a multi-sectoral approach to improve the quality of life of IDPs.
ACTED, 2017
Women participating in livelihoods training in northern Syria
ACTED, 2017
Women participating in livelihoods training in northern Syria
ACTED 2017
A woman, head of household, collecting her fertilizer (distributed by ACTED partners) as part of a home gardening kit programme, Northern Syria
ACTED, 2017
A subcontractor carried out the roof and ceiling repair of one of the 550 houses selected by ACTED for rehabilitation because of their insalubrity