Peter Shergold | Australia needs to step up in world refugee crisis

Given the vast distance from here to there, most of us don't spend much time thinking about what life might be like there. And yet what is happening in places like Kakuma is highly relevant to us in Australia.

It is developing countries like Kenya and neighbouring Uganda that are doing the heavy lifting when it comes to looking after displaced people, fleeing famine and violence.

It's a responsibility that must be shared more equitably around the world.

Consider this: In 1990, Kakuma had a population of 8000. Most were Turkana people, semi-nomadic pastoralists. Today it's home to more than 250,000 refugees and asylum seekers. In total, Kenya hosts more than half a million refugees; Uganda hosts more than 1.5 million. Most are from South Sudan, Somalia, Ethiopia, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Supporting these people is a burden that no nation, especially a developing, low-income country should have to shoulder alone.

I recently visited refugee camps in Uganda and Kenya in my role as Chair of Australia for UNHCR. The hardship faced by many refugees is gut wrenching. Their extraordinary resilience is inspiring.

In Uganda, I met a 76-year-old woman called Evasita. Last year she fled her home in the Democratic Republic of the Congo after an armed gang bludgeoned her adult children to death. Evasita managed to escape with her two grandchildren, aged eight and 16. They are now living in a tent in a Ugandan refugee settlement called Rwamwanja.

Evasita rises early to get her grandchildren to school and then tends a tiny plot of land in the afternoon in return for a dollar or two, her only source of income.

Evasita has nowhere to go and no other options. As I talked to her it was apparent that she worries deeply about how long she can continue working and taking care of her grandchildren.

If the UN Refugee Agency hadn't provided her with a tent and a few other essentials, she would have nothing.

While some refugees would like to move to Australia or Europe, their chances are miniscule. Less than 1 per cent of refugees are relocated to a third country for resettlement.

But here's the thing: most of them don't want to come to us; they simply want to go home. It's a desire that remains elusive for many. I met people who had lived in the same refugee camp for almost 20 years because it is still not safe to return home.

More than 114 million people are currently displaced around the world - the highest number in history.

Conflicts continue, as they always have, but now we must also contend with climate change. In the Horn of Africa, the worst drought in 40 years has pushed large numbers of people to the brink of famine.

The sad reality is that aid programs around the world are underfunded and struggling to meet the complex and ever-increasing need. In the camps I visited, the World Food Programme has had to cut food rations. People are hungry. They are desperate.

Visiting UNHCR's work in Kenya and Uganda gave me fresh insights into how important the charity dollar has become in dealing with displacement. It is imperative that governments make their contributions to UNHCR, but it's simply not enough.

Around the world, we all need to contribute more, particularly those of us living in wealthy countries. This includes businesses and wealthy philanthropists as well as the thousands of ordinary people who care enough to donate.

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The Global Refugee Forum will be held in Geneva next month. It will be a chance for governments, civil society and the private sector to build on the pledges and contributions they made at the first Forum in 2019.

This is all about responsibility sharing - recognising that a sustainable solution to refugee situations cannot be achieved without international co-operation.

Much depends on people who share a sense of humanitarian responsibility for others who have lost everything.

I've seen where the money goes: it pays teachers to educate bright young minds; it provides basic medical care; it allows people to grow their own food on bite-sized pieces of arable land; it supports livelihood programs; and it provides cash assistance so that refugees have the dignity to make their own choices about where to spend their money.