Somaliland
Life in Somaliland
Women and girls often lack a strong voice in society, as decisions in the home and government are made almost exclusively by men.
In Somaliland, 97% of girls aged between four and 11 have endured female genital mutilation (FGM), a brutal procedure that can cause death and countless health complications.
Low literacy rates and limited awareness of legal rights also make women vulnerable to domestic violence and sexual abuse. After the war, Somaliland’s education system collapsed. While schools are reopening and primary school enrolment increasing, the quality of education is poor and many teachers remain unqualified.
Somaliland in statistics
- 3. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-14115069 ↩
- 4. https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/press-release/2014/01/29/new-world-bank-gdp-and-poverty-estimates-for-somaliland ↩
- 5. https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/press-release/2014/01/29/new-world-bank-gdp-and-poverty-estimates-for-somaliland ↩
- 6. https://microdata.worldbank.org/index.php/catalog/2818/download/39898 (PDF) ↩

Malyuun Ahmed Omer, 30, and her one-year-old son Sakeriye-Ahmed are suffering from terrible hunger because of El Niño related drought, western Somaliland
Photo: Jennifer Huxta/ActionAid
What we do in Somaliland
Our work in Somaliland displacement camps
- We are distributing women's survival kits, which include clothes, underwear, soap, torches, baby lotion and whistles.
- We are providing families with cash transfers, which go directly to women and empower them to decide how best to prioritise their families' needs.
- We are training women's coalitions in leadership skills, empowering them to lead their camps.
Our work ending hunger in Somaliland
ActionAid works to end hunger among small farmers and pastoralists in Somaliland.
We work mainly with women who are left to fend for themselves when men migrate to cities or coastal regions in search of water for cattle. We provide tools such as rakes, pickaxes and tractor rental to help increase harvests and improve nutrition.
During the East Africa food crisis we supported at least 64,000 people, distibuting 6,000 tonnes including rice, sugar, wheat flour and cooking oil, and thousands of litres of water.
Getting children into school
In 2014, we ran a campaign which brought education ministers face to face with more than 1,000 parents to discuss how to get children into school.
ActionAid now works with parents and teachers to build classrooms and separate toilets for girls and boys, and with the Ministry of Education to develop training programmes for newly qualified teachers.
These raise awareness of the importance of girl’s education, and challenge the view that FGM and early marriage are safe ways to protect girls from pre-marital sex.
Protecting girls from FGM
We are working to end FGM in Somaliland by helping communities to learn and openly talk about its damaging effects, running youth groups to help boys and girls speak up to end FGM, and supporting groups to lobby governments to help pass anti-FGM laws.
Women are at the centre of our work, but to end FGM we need whole communities to say no, so including men is essential.
Through our work, teenage boys and men are publically declaring that they will not marry women who have had the cut and are being powerful ambassadors.
Nimo and her children, Somaliland, walked long distances in search of water
ActionAid
Supporting women in Somaliland affected by hunger
35-year-old Nimo and her children walked for eight days in search of water.
For rural communities like hers, land and livestock are key to survival, but after years of drought she was left with nothing. Her animals were now too weak to make meat or milk.
On the journey to find water, Nimo instead found a trail of animal carcasses.
Learn more about our work ending hungerI breastfeed my six-month-old son, but he cannot get enough milk as I don't have food."
Ending FGM in Somaliland
Zeinab underwent female genital mutilation (FGM) when she was just four years old.
Her father didn't want her to have it, but her mother organised it while her father was away on a trip, as she thought the social consequences of not being cut outweighed FGM's damaging effects.
"It was very painful," Zeinab told us.
I always remember. I can still hear the sound of the cutting."
Having FGM has caused Zeinab serious health problems for the rest of her life. Now, she is determined that the next generation of girls does not face the same trauma.
As women’s rights coordinator of ActionAid Somaliland, she is leading a programme that is training boys and girls, men and women, to understand the harmful effects of FGM.
Read the full storyZeinab, women’s rights coordinator at ActionAid Somaliland
ActionAid
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