An Iraqi refugee family living in Jordan was in dire straights. Their savings had run out and the father required emergency chemotherapy for leukemia. Friends helped pay the hospital bill, but they had no money left to cover rent. The patient’s wife, child, and mother were facing eviction.

International Relief & Development’s networks of volunteers encounter situations like this often. Rather than let the thousands of Iraqi refugees in Jordan disappear, in areas rumored to have many Iraqi residents, IRD established community action committees with local leaders to form an extensive Iraqi volunteer outreach network. Members of this network earned the trust of other Iraqis by initially providing health check-ups in the home, referring Iraqis to partner clinics for free primary and secondary care, and providing additional follow-up home visits and check-ups.

Using this network of volunteers, IRD was able to compile unrivaled demographic information about the Iraqi refugee community in Amman, Irbid, and Zarqa, identifying an estimated 90 percent of needy Iraqis in Jordan. This allowed IRD to quickly assist needy families whether through its own internal assistance programs or referring these families to other assistance groups.

The outreach volunteers, through the IRD management team, linked the family facing eviction with an international agency which had funding to assist them with money for rent. It is very possible that without IRD’s volunteer network, they would have slipped through the cracks entirely.