Meeting : interview with Nadjilem Mayade, humanitarian access and security advisor for the Sahel region

VOCATION Nadjilem Mayade has been helping populations affected by various humanitarian crises for the last fifteen years. Below is an interview with SOLIDARITÉS INTERNATIONAL’s new Humanitarian Access and Security Advisor for the Sahel region.

I started out as a humanitarian worker in 2005, during which there was a huge influx of Sudanese refugees seeking asylum in Chad, my home country. I had just finished my training as an agricultural engineer when I decided to join an NGO whose teams were working in refugee camps in the northeast part of the country. I wanted to improve the region’s food security and living conditions. During my first job as an ‘agriculture and natural resources’ assistant, I was in charge of promoting market gardening around the tents, where the climate was arid and hostile, and helping reforest the camp where we were working. That is how I became a ‘humanitarian’!

Developing regional expertise

Several years later, once I had occupied various positions linked to food security and agricultural crises in Chad, SOLIDARITÉS INTERNATIONAL recruited me at the end of 2013 to  manage their ‘food security and livelihoods’ program for displaced populations and host communities living in the far-north of the Central African Republic.

SOLIDARITÉS INTERNATIONAL then asked me to work in Mali, Chad, Cameroon and the Central African Republic. In august 2021, I was appointed “Humanitarian Access and Security Advisor” for the SAHEL region.

I am committed to SOLIDARITÉS INTERNATIONAL due to the high-quality work carried out by the teams, which is recognized both locally and internationally.

Detailed field experience and knowledge of local languages

During my various missions, I gained valuable field experience and honed my analytical skills. This expertise, combined with my proficiency in local languages, allowed me to solve many of the challenges that came my way. By talking to locals and public authorities, I was able to identify the needs, expectations, and questions of each group. My language skills also helped to both facilitate access for humanitarian teams into sensitive intervention zones, as well as resolve certain conflictual situations. Finally, by maintaining regular contact with various stakeholders, I was able to provide extensive feedback and information to the humanitarian community and our institutional partners. Communication is essential in the humanitarian sector. T That is what I really love about my work; it gives me the opportunity to discover other cultures and meet many interesting people.