General Context
The outbreak of the civil war in Syria in March 2011 resulted in the migration of an estimated 9 million Syrians who fled from their homes and sought refuge within their country and in neighboring countries. The United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) reported that more than 3 million Syrians have fled to the immediate neighbors including Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey. This means that about one-quarter of the population has been displaced from the country. An additional 6.5 million are internally displaced within the country. Over the last two years, the migration of these refugees has worsened to the point where one can comfortably say that this will result in permanent shift of the population just like the crisis that rocked Palestine in 1948 and 1967. According to humanitarian aid officials and the United Nations (UN), if this happens, then countries like Jordan and Lebanon will bear the grave implications of the crisis. At the moment, the Syrian refugees account for one in six people in Lebanon. The biggest refugee camp in Jordan is now regarded as the country’s fourth largest city (Dahi 46).
The Syrian refugee crisis is far much worse than just a humanitarian and regional crisis. The problem has ballooned and is now a real threat to world peace and security. Tens of thousands of the displaced refugees may have to be resettled by the UN in countries like Germany and Britain which can afford to accommodate them. The humanitarian aid appeal by the UN has been increasing over the years to about 3.3 billion US dollars. This is by far the largest amount of money that a world entity has ever sought to address a single crisis. The money is not only used to help the refugees. Rather, it had to be extended to Jordan and Lebanon so as to help them make the needed social changes necessary in dealing with the populations that were rapidly expanding. The Syrian refugee crisis has exceeded almost all the refugee crisis that global establishments have ever dealt with in the last 40 years (Carpi 407). The number of people succumbing to the conflict has also increased at a rate that is way above the capacity of the international organizations ability to cope. This paper seeks insight on the Syrian refugee crisis by addressing the question on how the crisis has impacted on the economy in Lebanon due to the high influx of refugees’ accommodated within the country.
The Actors
The conflict in Syria has had severe and negative implications on the Lebanese economy that has seriously undermined the close ties that these two countries throughout history. The economic growth in Lebanon has gone down by about 2.9 percent. This is equivalent to billions of dollars lost through low economic activity. The largest impact comes from the uncertainty and insecurity spillover which impacts negatively on the confidence of both the consumer and the investor. The low economic activities have also exerted a negative pressure on the government revenue. Additionally, the large influx of refugees in Lebanon has increased the demand for public services (Turner 392). The crisis is therefore damaging the public finances in Lebanon yet these institutions are structurally weak.
The impact of the Syrian refugee crisis has prompted the international community to shift operational and policy responses in their assistance efforts. The aid organizations now recognize the need to have a balanced and comprehensive approach in addressing the problem. These organizations have shifted their attention towards the allocation of resources that will help to meet the immediate and overall needs of the growing population. A large amount of resources have been channeled by humanitarian organizations through the UN and the UNHCR to help Lebanon cope with the crisis. This change is reflected in the increase of the humanitarian appeal that was incorporated in the Regional Response Plan. The amount that was allocated has increased from 274 million US dollars to 1.66 billion US dollars (Carpi 412). A huge percentage of this money is used in supporting the local Lebanese communities and is implemented through international and local government aid channels.
The need for a balanced approach has also been implemented successfully by aid agencies on a small scale. However, the adoption of a formal strategy geared towards availing immediate humanitarian support for Syrian and Lebanese refugee communities greatly recognizes the need to stabilize the condition on broad basis. The international community through partner agencies like the UN and the UNHCR has acted quickly in helping Lebanon to cope with the humanitarian crisis brought about by the influx of refugees. These institutions have established registration centers and have garnered support and mobilized financial resources (Carpi 416). This is a great strategy that will help to address the crisis in the long run.
The situation in Syria is highly unpredictable and the impact it has on Lebanon cannot be ascertained even if the crisis stops abruptly. The refugees might still opt to stay in Lebanon due to the immense damage that Syria has suffered as a result of the crisis. Thus, the effect of the Syrian crisis will still be felt on the economy for a long time even after calm returns to Syria. The international community through its partner agencies will have to ensure that they can successfully overcome the economic challenges caused by the increase in population (Carpi 416). The financial institutions also have to be strengthened to enable the country to deal with additional pressure economic microeconomic framework
Before the war in Syria broke out, the public financial institutions in Lebanon were structurally weak. This means that the Syrian refugee crisis has put a strain on the already weakened institutions and the deficit is expected to increase by over 2.6 billion US dollars. Lebanon had initially gone through a period of robust growth and its debt-to-GDP ratio had reduced to 13 percent just before the Syrian conflict from 180 percent in 2006. However, most of the improvement of public finances was greatly facilitated by a cyclical improvement since most of the structural reforms that were envisioned as part of the Paris III conference have not been implemented fully. However, this worrying trend in debt-to-GDP ratio is a key indicator of the imminent challenges that the country’s economy has been subjected to due to the refugee crisis (Turner 387).
If the crisis in Syria persists, then it may take a long time for the Lebanon’s economy to fully stabilize and even go back to the pre-crisis levels. The public finances in Lebanon are also under severe and rapidly increasing pressure which is not suitable for the country due to the initial weak public finances. The spillover from the conflict is approximated to have reduced the revenue collection by 1.5 billion US dollars in 2014. This is mainly due to the direct impact of the crisis on key sectors such as tourism and the indirect impacts manifested through the weakened economy. The country expenditure has also increased and the total budgetary spending had gone up to over 1.1 billion US dollars by 2014 (Turner 386-404).
The increase in government expenditure is attributed to the refugee crisis which has significantly contributed to a high increase in the demand for and consumption of public services by the refugees. Consequently, the crisis has frozen the notable progress that Lebanon had made in reducing its debt-to-GDP ratio by increasing the interest risk premium, lowering economic growth, and widening the fiscal deficits. By the end of 2012, the debt ratio in Lebanon had increased for the first time since 2006 and this has been going up over the years (Carpi 411). The Syrian conflict has had an estimated fiscal cost of about 340 million US dollars on social safety, education, and health sectors. About 1.6 billion US dollars, which accounts for 4 percent of the GDP , is needed to stabilize these sectors and to restore the quality of these services to the initial level before the conflict (Lobatos 381). A large portion of this money may be used in short-term creation of jobs.
The conflict has also impacted negatively on the human capital conditions, health, livelihoods, and poverty levels of the people living in Lebanon. By the end of 2013, an additional 170,000 Lebanese people had been pushed to poverty and the number of those living below the poverty line had also increased. The unemployment rate had doubled and more of the unskilled Lebanese youth constituted the unemployment bracket (Lobatos 381). The already weakened public social services are continually challenged by the influx of refugees and this has heightened the social tensions among the refugees and the Lebanese communities.
More and more people are being pushed into poverty while those who were already poor have fallen deeper into poverty. This is worsened by the fact that poverty level in Lebanon was significant before the conflict and the regional disparity in living conditions was great. More than 1 million people in Lebanon were living on less than 4 US dollars per day. The social safety nets (SSN) were poorly targeted, fragmented and weak. The Ministry of Social Affairs (MOSA) had even taken up reforms to be implemented on the SSN system. To date, the utilization of MOSA’s social and health programs has gone up by over 40 percent. However, for the situation to stabilize, an additional 176 million US dollars is needed to improve the National Poverty Targeting Program for the vulnerable and poor Lebanese (Refaat and Mohanna 763).
The health sector has also been strained by the influx of refugees. The demand for health services has gone up, the amount of money that the Ministry of Public Health owes contracted hospitals has also gone up, the country now has a shortage of health workers including nurses , and the cases of communicable diseases has also increased. The refugees live in overcrowded spaces that lack basic amenities like water and sanitation infrastructure. These environmental conditions increase the risk of disease outbreaks and infections. This has contributed to the marked increase for health services over the years (Turner 391). Forty percent of the primary health care visits in December 2012 were from Syrian refugees only. The high demand for hospital care has resulted in crowded hospitals that compromise healthcare access. This also exerts a financial pressure on the hospitals, cause medical shortages, and increase the associated cost of care. The vulnerable people in the community are thus exposed to high risks of morbidity due to delayed and poor quality of health care. By 2014, the health sector needed about 306 million US dollars to restore their system back to the pre-crisis level (Refaat and Mohanna 763).
The impact of the refugee crisis has also been extended to the education sector. This is reflected in the rising demand for these services mainly to accommodate the children of the Syrian refugees. The phenomenon has also impacted negatively on the quality of public education and created a need for non-formal education. The enrollment for basic education in Lebanon had been stable prior to the conflict and gender parity was achieved. The public schools accommodated 30 percent of the total number of students enrolled in the country predominantly from lower socio-economic backgrounds. The Syrian refugee crisis gave the Ministry of Education and Higher Education no choice but to provide open access to the displaced children in their public schools. About 40,000 displaced children were accommodated in the public schools by the end of 2012 and this cost the government an additional 29 million US dollars. Twenty four million dollars of this was given by donors through the UN agencies (Lobatos 382). The cots have been going up as more refugees seek refuge and enroll their children in these schools.
The above figures only cater for refugees who enroll in public schools. About 65 percent of refugees have not enrolled in formal schooling and this has create the need for the establishment of informal education in a bid to ensure that that children are not exposed to child labor and other negative vices. Most of the employers in Lebanon now target young children and employ them so as to maximize their returns from the cheap labor that they offer. The children are also forced to work by the prevailing circumstances when the family cannot afford to cater for all their basic requirements. The government thus has to spend extra so as to ensure that the children get some form of education by establishing informal schools (Lobatos 383).
Regional Perspective
The refugee crisis has also impacted negatively on the trade sector by affecting the trade of goods and services. The most impacted of this is the tourism sector. Lebanon’s economy has a large trade sector and has for a long time been Syria’s trading partner. Additionally, most of the trade carried out in Lebanon transits through Syria. The destabilization in Syria has resulted in a reduced number of exports that were previously channeled through the country. Sharp reductions in trade flow for consumer goods and food products were experienced during the first half of 2013. It has also affected the tourism industry since the number of international visitors has significantly reduced since 2010. The trade disruptions have also caused the domestic prices of staple foods such as wheat flour to go up and this has great repercussions for the poor people in Lebanon (Turner 394).
The economic activities in Lebanon have slowed down significantly due to the refugee crisis. Prior to the crisis, there was a strong polarization of political parties and this interfered with the political and business confidence. The situation was worsened by the crisis with the stabilization of prices in the real estate sector. The prices went up to a point where the Lebanese citizens could not afford them. The foreign demand for these houses also reduced as a result since the regional buyers were forced to revisit their demand for these houses. This was made worse by the establishment of refugee camps which even made it easier for the Syrian refugees to find cheaper accommodation. The poor Lebanese dwellers also sought to benefit from the humanitarian assistance by pretending to be Syrian refugees (Turner 401). The government thus lost a great amount of revenue from this sector of the economy.
Interdisciplinary Approach
The Functionalism Theory
The number of Syrian refugees in Lebanon has been increasing over the years. The living conditions of the Syrians have been deteriorating as a result of this and the Lebanese people have been affected too. The conflict theory highlights the concept in which people have to fight for limited resources. The fight for resources has brought about tension with regard to the use of social and economic facilities. Since the crisis began, the Lebanese government has embraced the functionalism theory by adopting an open-door policy. The policy allows Syrians to stay in the country even if they entered illegally. The government has also opened its doors to the support of non-governmental organizations and to the humanitarian assistance offered by the international communities. According to the functionalism theory, people have to work together for the proper functioning of the entire organ. The Lebanese government facilitates this coexistence by exempting illegal Lebanese immigrants from deportation (Refaat and Mohanna 763).
Rational Choice Theory
The Lebanese government does not recognize Syrians even though they now constitute a third of the country’ population. The government has not done much to set up refugee camps so as to ease humanitarian aid and help address the crisis. Thus, most Syrians prefer to stay in this country illegally since registration would force them to receive aid in an organized manner and to live in camps which actually provide better and safer shelter. However, no visa regime exists between the two countries. Thus, the rational choice theory is highlighted by the fact that Syrians can maximize their own self-interests by choosing to move to Lebanon over all the other neighboring countries. A Syrian who has a valid ID can therefore move to Syria and stay up to six months. Visa free regimes have also been established between turkey and Syria and between Syria and Jordan but the regime with Lebanon is still the fairest of all (Turner 389).
Lebanon has had a long historical experience with refugees coupled with the fragile political structure in the country. This has made it hard for the government to establish a stable migration or refugee policy. This has also made it difficult for the government to register Syrian refugees crossing the border and to organize for protection and the supply of basic needs. The Lebanese government went through a crisis that lasted for 10 month and this contributed to the government’s failure to adopt a national plan at the time when the influx of Syrian refugees was highest. The country directed their attention to the formation of a new government after the resignation of Prime Minister Najib in 2013. A great portion of the problem was resolved when the new Prime Minister Salam was chosen in 2104 (Dahi 47). However, it will still take time for proper policies to be formulated and implemented since it is impossible to realize all this in a short time.
Conclusion
The Syrian refugee crisis is a concept that cannot be ignored due to the high number of refugees in the neighboring country especially Lebanon. The conflict has had far reaching effects on the people and the economy of Lebanon as a whole. The rapid increase in population has generated a great deal of problems for the government of Lebanon and its people. The impact is also felt by the international assistance community who have spent a huge amount of money to stabilize the situation this far. Actually, the crisis has called for the use of large amounts of money that have gone way beyond that which has ever been spent on a single crisis. The influx of refugees has put a lot of pressure on the limited facilities and this has negatively affected the economy due to the increased government spending. Schools and hospitals have been stretched beyond their capacities and the government has been forced to seek for additional funds to accommodate this increase. The Lebanese government has been working well with the international bodies like the UN and UNHCR to help resolve the crisis and to address the challenges that arise and those that may arise in the future.
Work cited
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