MENA’s Forced Displacement Crisis

The latest MENA Quarterly Economic Brief estimates growth in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) Region to fall short of expectation at 2.6 percent in 2015, about 0.2 percentage points below the October 2015 forecast. The World Bank expects the economic outlook to remain “cautiously pessimistic” in the short term. The recent poor performance of several MENA economies, and their dim prospects for the future, are partly driven by the civil wars that have created death, destruction and significant growth shortfalls in both conflict countries; Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Libya and their neighbors. This Quick Note summarizes the findings of the report including the important channel of forced displacement, which has become a crisis.Overall, millions of Syrians, Iraqis, Yemenis and Libyans have been forced to flee their homes or displaced with in the country. They are in need of urgent humanitarian and financial assistance. According to the United Nations (U.N.) for Syria only, it will take US 7.7 billion dollars to meet the urgent needs of the most vulnerable people in 2016.