Since the founding of the RET organization in 2000, we have worked in more than 32 countries, implementing more than 360 projects to help our beneficiaries overcome multi-dimensional adversities. We have helped refugee adolescents, and youth in refugee camps; we have assisted communities made vulnerable by displacement, violence, armed conflict and disasters from all over the world. We have provided a broad diversity of programs aimed at protecting and building the resilience of youth and women affected by crises, and conflicts. Read more about Vision & Mission
Today, we reimagined our interventions, envisioning a world in which vulnerable young people overcome multi-dimensional adversities and are enabled to lead their own development journey and prosper beyond our assistance.
The Nexus: Humanitarian Aid – Peace – Development (HPD)
International assistance is traditionally separated into humanitarian relief and development cooperation. Humanitarian organizations offer short-term protection during emergencies, while development organizations work in stabilized environments to improve long-term social and economic well-being.
RET is committed to working in the Humanitarian Aid – Peace – Development triple nexus, designing and implementing interventions with short, medium- and long-term multiple-year perspectives, primarily focused on young people and women in crisis and fragile contexts.
RET’s actions respond to protracted crises by preventing, preparing for, and responding to those crises and conflicts. Also, RET provides tailor-made solutions and programs, designed to be sensitive to respective context, culture, gender, age groups, disabilities, and diversity, to ultimately build refugee & vulnerable local youth and their families’ capacities and sense of agency so that they can become self-reliant and resilient in the long run.
RET’s actions, complemented with sustainable long-term development interventions designed to build the self-reliance of communities and to end the need for external support, and meet the requirements of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG’s 2030).
By using the triple nexus approach in eleven key areas of intervention, RET’s mandate, focused on young people, allows its teams to propose relevant solutions and ensure a more inclusive and durable impact.
Transition into Broader Development Work
Providing protection and multi-dimensional solutions particularly for youth and women has always been our core commitment. Today, we are taking on a catalytic role, complementing our actions with transitional to development interventions and providing short-to-medium term interventions that benefit refugee youth, their families, and host communities with the purpose of mitigating tensions, advancing social cohesion, strengthening resilience to climate hazards and natural disasters, and enhancing socio-economic integration in host countries or upon returning home. By means, (1) building the self-reliance of communities (2) creating durable solutions (3) ending the need of external support (4) advancing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG’s 2030) and especially SDG 8 Decent Work.
All RET’s interventions benefit specifically refugee and/or displaced young people and in particularly young women, and all its interventions include support to people with disabilities.
RET became engaged in development projects in host countries and in protracted crises, where refugees are being “integrated” and or “locally included” under the government policies, and where returnees are facing instability, fragility, and risks in their home country.
Young People & Women & Girls: at the center of RET Strategy
Young people: RET has put at the center of its work the commitment to protect and promote the rights of young people affected by conflict, violence, disasters and/or displacement. We believe in the meaningful role young people can play to voice, advocate for and address issues affecting their lives, as well as the ones of their families and communities. RET is committed to promoting young people affected by conflict, violence, disasters and or displacement meaningful participation and support to constructively engage in all matters that affect their lives.
Young people are in the center of RET’s strategy setting, design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation, and in all measures that provide a response to their concerns and aspirations. As such, they are not considered as solely “beneficiaries”, but active participants, respected contributors, partners and/or leaders in humanitarian, stabilization operations, peacebuilding and development contexts. RET commits to empowering refugee and host/local youth to be resilient, fulfill their potential and become actors of positive social change by realizing their rights and assuming their responsibilities, leading and supporting peacebuilding initiatives, contributing to rebuild fairer and more prosperous societies, and meet their individual and collective life projects.
Young Women & Girls: RET is committed to protecting and building the resilience of young women and girls in crises and fragile contexts. In response to RET’s commitment towards girls, young women and women in crises and fragile contexts and to the sustainable development goal 3 (SDG 3) to live healthy lives & to promote wellbeing for all and (SDG 5) to advance gender equality and women & girls’ empowerment. RET commits to replicate its lead approach for socio-economic empowerment of young women and women in contexts of fragility (WSEE, Turkey) in order to reach increasing numbers of refugee and displaced women, in particularly young women worldwide. Learn more about the leap Natural (WSEE) project in Turkey.
Additionally, RET is committed to provide through its protection interventions, services and responses to young people and women affected by displacement (refugees, IDPs, returnees and those under a humanitarian protection status). This includes, but it is not limited to, legal assistance, medical and psychosocial support (individually and/or in groups), prevention and response to Gender Based Violence, including case management and referrals.
RET will continue to promote services and responses that are cultural, age, gender, disability and diversity sensitive; and to work in close collaboration with local and national actors in charge of protection and well-being in order to enhance their capacities to address the needs and concerns of refugee/displaced vulnerable groups (e.g. people with disabilities), along with young women and women, and to improve the quality of its service delivery in the long term.