Baltimore-based Lutheran World Relief has announced a $539,000 grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to support its efforts to assist the estimated forty thousand people in Sudan who have been displaced from their homes as a result of more than two decades of war.

Most of the people returning to their homes after the signing of a Comprehensive Peace Accord, created to end Africa's longest-running conflict, have limited, if any, economic resources. The lack of resources among returning Sudanese increases the strain on existing the population, which has experienced repeated displacement, chronic job insecurity, and prolonged periods of drought and flooding. In fact, southern Sudan's rankings in the areas of education, literacy, and child malnutrition are among the worst in the world, and the region hovers near the bottom in most other social indicators.

"Sudan continues to exist on the cusp of a humanitarian crisis of quite daunting proportions," said LWR president Kathryn Wolford. "We applaud the Gates Foundation for helping to address the monumental challenges that need immediate attention in Sudan."