This paper examines the impact of cash assistance provided to Afghan refugees returning from Pakistan on household outcomes post-return. Between 2016 and 2018, UNHCR assisted more than 458,000 documented Afghan refugees who returned from Pakistan. Between July 2016...
JDC Literature Review
Global Trends: Forced Displacement in 2023
The 2024 Global Trends report presents the most recent official statistics on refugees, asylum-seekers, internally displaced persons (IDPs), stateless people, and returned refugees for the year 2023. The data included in the report is sourced from governments, non-governmental organizations, and UNHCR.
Global Report on Internal Displacement 2023: Internal Displacement and Food Insecurity
The 2023 Global Report on Internal Displacement (GRID) presents global figures for internal displacement due to conflict and violence and disasters. This year’s report also includes a special section on the intersecting dynamics and consequences of displacement and food insecurity.
The labor market reintegration of returned refugees in Afghanistan
This paper investigates the labor market outcomes of returned refugees in Afghanistan. The authors examine the factors influencing the labor market outcomes of returned refugees compared to non-migrants, and in particular, whether the returnees’ migration and return...
Can Communities Take Charge? The Assessment of Learning Outcomes and Social Effects of Community-Based Education: A Randomized Field Experiment in Afghanistan
This report presents the Phase Two results for the Assessment of Learning Outcomes and Social Effects of Community-Based Education in Afghanistan (ALSE) project. ALSE is a multiyear, mixed-methods set of randomized controlled trials that assess strategies to improve...
Living Conditions and Settlement Decisions of Recent Afghan Returnees: Findings from a 2018 Phone Survey of Afghan Returnees and UNHCR data
More than 2 million displaced Afghans have returned to Afghanistan between 2014 and 2016, the majority from Pakistan, including over half a million registered refugees who returned under UNHCR’s voluntary return program. This report describes and analyzes the living...
A Different Kind of Pressure: The Cumulative Effects of Displacement and Return in Afghanistan
At the end of 2018, there were nearly 2.6 million IDPs in Afghanistan displaced by conflict and violence, and more than 2.4 million Afghan refugees had fled abroad since 2012. More than 3.3 million Afghan refugees returned between 2012 and 2019, mostly from Pakistan...
Escaping to War: Where to Next? A Research Study on the Challenges of IDP Protection in Afghanistan
A record 653,000 Afghans were internally displaced during 2016, bringing the estimated number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Afghanistan to more than 1.5 million at the end of 2016. Many IDPs have been displaced multiple times. At the same time, the...
Afghanistan’s Displaced People: A Socio-Economic Profile, 2013-2014
This paper analyzes data from the 2013-14 Afghanistan Living Conditions Survey (ALCS) to compare the socio-economic profiles of returned refugees, IDPs, and non-displaced hosts. The survey covers the largest return of Afghans following the fall of the Taliban in 2002,...
Pakistan’s Urban Refugees: Steps towards Self-reliance
Sixty-eight percent of Afghan refugees in Pakistan live outside of camps, mostly in and around major urban centers. Almost all urban refugees in Pakistan are engaged in livelihood activities (transport business, gemstone trading, carpet production), making a...