Iraq — Protracted Displacement Study: An in-depth analysis of the main districts of displacement (May-December 2018)

In November 2018, the International Organization for Migration’s (IOM) Displacement Tracking Matrix (DTM) Unit, the Returns Working Group (RWG), and Social Inquiry, with input and support from the Ministry of Migration and Displacement (MoMD) within the Federal Government of Iraq, published an in-depth analysis on “Reasons to Remain: Categorizing Protracted Displacement in Iraq”. The aim of this report was to build a categorization framework for protracted displacement as the basis for future study, monitoring and policy development in relation to the resolution of internal displacement across all populations affected by the conflict in Iraq.

While the report defined categories of obstacles to return and provided estimates of the proportion of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) falling in each of the categories, it did not identify where the IDPs facing these obstacles can be found, and most importantly, where they are from. To address this, IOM DTM completed an analysis of the remaining out-of-camp IDP population in areas of displacement along multiple indicators, which allowed for the identification of their reasons and obstacles for non-return as well as their displacement situation. DTM also completed a similar and complementary analysis on IDPs’ main areas of origin, presented in the document “Protracted Displacement Study: An In-Depth Analysis of the Main Districts of Origin”. Although some of the analysis touches upon the situation of in-camp IDPs, two factors led to the decision to focus most of the analysis on out-of-camp IDPs. Firstly, the secondary data review showed that the knowledge base on in-camp IDPs was significantly greater than that of out-of-camp IDPs. Moreover, our analysis showed that these two groups face quite different displacement situations, leading to the decision to analyze them separately and prioritize analysis of the situation of out-of-camp IDPs.

As IDPs are dispersed across over 3,000 locations in more than 100 districts of displacement, the analysis focused on the districts containing the majority of the IDP caseload Using the latest available DTM dataset at the time of the analysis (Dec 2018), it was found that 83% of all out-of-camp IDPs can be found in the top 21 districts of displacement, and 90% in the top 32 districts across 14 governorates. While all 32 districts were analyzed to better understand protracted displacement, only the top 21 will presented here as the main districts of displacement in the format of a factsheet following a common structure to facilitate comparison. This reference note, containing an overall presentation of the analyzed indicators and key findings, aims to explain and complement the factsheets.