A man from South Sudan shows what financial transitions can look like for highly educated refugees.
Spoon, a male South Sudanese refugee, shows what relatively successful financial transitions can look like for highly educated refugees. Possessing skills that are in short supply in camp, both he and his wife have gotten work with NGOs and, as long as the NGO funding is available, can earn even more than they did back home. Even while Spoon earns a decent living in Uganda, he longs to return home to his land, his extended family, and his cows.
Spoon was among the most well-educated refugees we met in Uganda. Spoon’s father paid 95,000 UGX ($25.77) per term for him to attend secondary school in Moyo, a city in Uganda near the South Sudanese border. Spoon has some family who live in Moyo, and he stayed with them while attending secondary school in the city. He then attended Upper Nile University in the northern region of South Sudan where he studied global public health and graduated in 2014. Spoon was able to attend university thanks to a scholarship that covered two of the four years of tuition. Tuition at Upper Nile University cost 24,000 SSP (roughly $200) per year, a significant cost regardless of class status in South Sudan.
Spoon’s university education in global health secured him a position as a field worker with a health NGO. He traveled across South Sudan promoting hygiene and disseminating public health information for about $10 per day.
“I was in the field working for [a health NGO] as a Hygiene Promoter when the violence first broke out. I returned home to be with my family – my wife and three kids at the time. We stayed in our home town for two months before leaving. I thought the insecurity was going to end quickly, but when we heard about violence in Juba [the South Sudanese capital], we knew it was time to go.”
Spoon fled South Sudan with one sister and her four children, two nephews from another sister, his wife, and their three children. His sister’s husband was a government soldier, and Spoon was looking after his family in his absence. Spoon’s other sister divorced her husband in 2005, the two nephews from that marriage were living with Spoon’s family when Spoon decided it was time to leave.
“We only came to Uganda with small things like utensils, some luggage, and documents. I had bought expensive iron sheets for our home, and had to leave them in Juba just before we left for Uganda.”
Crossing the border into Uganda can be a complicated process.
“There are major borders and minor borders. It costs $50 to cross a major border — with the visa —and it is a risk that you will be caught leaving the country without permission from OPM. Instead, we went to a minor border and crossed easily there.”
Life in Bidi Bidi was difficult, especially because of the limited economic opportunities. Monthly rations of basic food staples represented one of the few consistent assets available to refugees. Refugees also receive small plots of land to build homes and grow crops on, though they don’t receive enough land to grow enough food for survival.
“There’s not enough land to cultivate in Zone 2. You can see how close together we are. Instead, you see people starting businesses to survive, and there are more here than the other zones.”
Businesses in Bidi Bidi also struggled as very few refugees earned an income or had access to income-generating activities that would give them money to spend. Considering these barriers, Spoon and his family have done well for themselves.
Spoon worked as a Community Mobilizer with a local donor-funded project for two years shortly after arriving in Bidi Bidi. He did similar work to his Hygiene Promotion role, earning 250,000 shillings ($67.81) per month. When the project ran out of funding in 2018, he was out of work for some time but soon landed another NGO role. He worked as a Community Facilitator, training his neighbors in farming best practices. He would organize farming cooperatives (28 in Zone 2 alone) that could grow vegetables at scale and then sell them together as an income-generating activity.
Spoon’s wife also worked in Bidi Bidi as a Sexual and Gender Violence (SGV) Volunteer with a refugee-support NGO. She earned 10,000 shillings ($2.71) per day on a one-year contract. During our study, her contract was nearly up and she was waiting to hear back on another paid volunteer role with the same organization. She also sells tomatoes from a stall at the nearby market in Zone 2, though business is slow.
Spoon also holds a position in the camp’s decentralized governing structure. He says that people used to segregate by tribe in the camp’s early years but are now interacting more across tribal groups. Spoon suggested that violence in Bidi Bidi is the result of inactive youth and easy access to moonshine, not intertribal issues.
Spoon has made some significant investments since arriving in Uganda, which is unusual for Bidi Bidi refugees.
“I have an uncle remaining at home, and he keeps an eye on some cattle that I own there. We speak every two weeks, and he seems to be keeping safe in South Sudan. I send money back to my uncle – usually 10,000 shillings ($2.71) every three months. I send the money with a friend I trust when they head across the border to South Sudan. They travel usually to cultivate land they own across the border.”
Spoon is part of a self-organized savings group that was formed four months ago by twenty members. The group runs on a VSLA model, and it costs members 5,000 shillings ($1.36) per share with between one to five shares available for purchase to each member every week. The group also offers loans at 10% monthly interest, and Spoon recently took out a 200,000 shilling ($54.24) loan to purchase twenty liters of honey.
“The twenty liters cost me 120,000 shillings ($32.55). I had a friend buy the honey at the South Sudan border and paid him 8,000 shillings ($2.17) to make the delivery. I resold the honey for 150,000 shillings ($40.68), making a 30,000 shilling ($8.14) profit. People usually buy the honey in small amounts — anywhere from 5,000 shillings ($1.36) for a cup to 200 ($0.05) for a small amount. The honey is typically used as an herbal medicine in lieu of actual medicines that are too expensive or inaccessible.”
Beyond being displaced from one’s home and enduring difficult economic circumstances in Bidi Bidi, Spoon and the Bidi Bidi refugees more broadly also suffer from inadequate medical care.
“I had to send some family to paid clinics for tests and treatment in Yumbe, which is more than an hour from Bidi Bidi on good days. The health center in Bidi Bidi is always short of basic medications. It feels like all they have is paracetamol. Maybe the Ugandans working at the health center are keeping medicine or stealing it for themselves. Who knows.”
Although Spoon is among the most successful refugees in Bidi Bidi, he still yearns to return home to South Sudan. He often asks his uncle and friends about the state of affairs back home, hoping that the violence will subside and that he and his family can go home.
“South Sudan is the motherland, and I also own land I want to return to.”