?? 1,000,000 lives

That’s how many people we’ve been able to reach in Sudan so far this year.

Let that sink in. A million people facing food shortages, displacement, cholera, famine—people surviving civil war. But we, NRC in Sudan, didn’t reach this milestone with ease, or fanfare. This came from grit, teamwork, pushing limits, rethinking approaches, and refusing to accept "the way it’s always been done."

At the start of the year, it felt like the deck was stacked against us. 25 million people in need, 10 million displaced, systems collapsing all around us, red tape and misgivings. We were told scaling up aid in this environment was impossible.

They were wrong.

We didn’t just scale—we tore up the old rulebook. We took risks on bold ideas where many others stayed cautious. We forged partnerships where doors were closing. We kept a positive, solutions-oriented mindset. We didn’t wait for permission to do things differently.

Instead of being just another cog in the system, we bet on first principles thinking and thought big, spoke up, doubled down on local capacities, and hacked through the chaos to create something new.

For example, a famine was declared in Sudan ten weeks ago. Frankly, we'd been expecting it, and had been organising to respond to a catastrophic hunger crisis wrapped in a brutal civil war. We wished well to those following the usual aid response model—international supply chain, aid truck convoys, lengthy distribution lines—but could see its scale-up would be slow, costly, and limited, and moreover would be tangled in red tape. So we opted for a different path.

Here’s how we cut that Gordian knot:

?? Empowered local bakeries to ramp up affordable food production, feeding hundreds of thousands.

?? Funded communal kitchens to help keep communities fed even as systems failed.

?? Distributed e-vouchers and cash where no one thought we could reach.

?? Broke through siege lines with local suppliers to already get food to over 10,000 displaced families.

?? Worked with our peers to challenge attacks against the food system and improve the broader humanitarian response .

Was it smooth? Absolutely not. Did we have to crack some eggs to make this omelette? Unfortunately so. But I guess that’s where I think a test of real leadership comes alive—on the edge of chaos or unknown, when there’s no road map and the only option is to rewrite what’s possible.

I should say, this milestone would have been impossible without an amazing team and teamwork, the support of astute donors and champions, and—most of all—the courage, ingenuity and generosity of Sudanese people and partners themselves. Immense thanks to everyone who has been a part of this journey so far.

But this milestone? It’s really just the beginning. A million people’s lives, their resilience, their hope. The beginning of a longer journey for us. We’ll keep pushing, adapting, and leading. The stakes have never been higher—and neither has our resolve.

~

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This famine response was just one of the areas we've transformed under pressure and scaled up—different paths but the same premise on our responses to the displacement crisis, the collapse of basic services, and to the armed conflict itself.

#1MillionStrong #LeadershipInCrisis #InnovationInAid #SudanRelief #DisruptTheSystem